The Girl Who Leapt Through Time
by TweedleDitz
Summary: Title's pretty clear. Like the movie but my version of it. More inside !  Because of some demand I will most likely continue it


**I do not own Soul Eater or any other character (hahaha get the pun?) **

**I do not own The Girl Who Leapt Through Time or a boy who leapt through time or a girl who leapt through a wall (hahahah get the pun?)**

**So have you seen the movie "The Girl Who Leapt Through Time"? Well **_**I have **_**and it was **_**AMAZING**_** I'm seriously in love with it. So here's my lovely version/crossover, you get the idea. And if you haven't seen the movie, well, I hope you enjoy it! Oh and don't watch the trailer for this movie, its about 10 times worse than the actual movie. The dub is **_**REALLY GOOD**_** just so you know.**

**So this is SUPER SUPER DUPER LONG because I'm making it as some sort of one-shot movie (: And the characters might be a little OOC but it keeps the story going so please imagine and bear with me haha.**

**And I made a few changes so it's a little changed up because I want this to be at least mostly original, but the actual idea of the story and most of the storyline came from that amazing movie and all its creators (: so I guess you could say it's sort of like a crossover, but with a few tweaks.**

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><p><strong><em><span>The Girl Who Leapt Through Time<span>_**

"_**Time waits for no one." -Anonymous**_

It's the final few months of school, and summer is on its way. A seventeen year old girl with green eyes rode down her street on her bike, pedaling as fast as she could. She had woken up late and was speeding towards her school.

_My name's Maka Albarn._

She could see the school within her vision as she neared it and rested her legs as she stopped peddling and let herself cruise for a little while, sighing as heavily as she could. She looked around and noticed all her other classmates finally used to wearing their summer uniforms, but also noticing the changes they all made to suit the hot weather. A boy rode his bike right up to hers, slightly bumping her and she quickly fell out of her relaxing cruise while she regained control of her handlebars and quickly got back her balance.

She looked over at the boy with a frown on her face as the two of them turned the corner together to go inside the gate of their school.

"Late again Maka?" He held back a chuckle, but couldn't hold back his smile.

"You're one to talk!" She shouted back playfully, starting to laugh herself.

He laughed as well, maybe even a little bit louder. "You know they've got these things, alarm clocks. Great stuff for waking up on time." He teased.

"If you get one first then _maybe_ I'll consider it." She joked back.

"Yeah I'll get right on that." He said sarcastically.

_That's one of my best friends, Soul Eater._

_Haha yeah, that's what I thought too when I first found out his last name._

The two of them locked their bikes on the school bike rack, which looked like a parking lot for bikes, and headed up together to their classroom. This was a usual day for them, being best friends since the beginning of the school year when he had first transferred to their school. He was the mysterious new kid and she somehow had the nerve to talk to him, and so began their friendship. It was like any other friendship, no romance and no awkwardness, they got along so well it never really occurred to them they were from different genders. They could be best guy friends and best girl friends at the same time.

"You two are here rather early." Another boy smiled and looked at his watch while his two friends entered the classroom and walked over to him, sitting in his desk. "Wow look at that, you even have twenty seconds to spare." He laughed. "Maybe you guys should start coming earlier."

Maka laughed as she took her seat next to him. She's been friends with him since the beginning of the school year, when her other friends went to different high schools and she was left alone he was the one who came up and talked to her, always friendly. She was also very close with him, and their relationship wasn't awkward either. "You know, maybe _you_ should come _later_ more often."

"Thrown away your alarm clock yet?" Soul added, taking his seat in front of Maka, laughing.

"Who said I ever used one?" He replied, which momentarily stunned the other two but soon the three of them were laughing all together.

_That's Kid, he's my other best friend._

_I don't know why but he never tells anyone his last name. I think he just wants to be famous for having just one name._

That's how it was, the three of them were like the three musketeers. Their friendship was mostly professional, meaning it wasn't romantic in the least nor was it weird. They always hungout together and they were each other's best friends. On some occasions Maka's best friend Tsubaki would join in their fun whenever Maka claimed that being around boys all the time was turning her into a tomboy. It wasn't an idea any of them opposed because they were all friends as if they were all the same gender.

The day passed by after the teacher walked in to begin it.

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Maka and Kim Diehl were the only two left in the classroom, they were on cleanup duty. Kim was erasing what was written on the board that day and writing what needed to be written for tomorrow before the day started. Maka was watering the plants.

"Hey, can you bring these books back up to the science lab?" She asked Maka as sweetly as possible.

"Huh? Oh yeah no problem!" She agreed and finished watering her final plant before putting the watering can away and grabbing the pile of books.

"Thanks a ton!"

She left the room and headed down the hall, trying to balance the books so they didn't fall over. The school was mostly empty, aside from the other students who had cleanup duty and were working on their own classrooms. Oh, and the afterschool sports as well. She used her foot to open the door and stumbled in. She wobbled over to the closet in the back of the room, which the door was already open surprisingly, and walked in, shutting the door behind her with her foot and turning the closet light on. Right before setting the books on the table she tripped on a loose floor tile and she threw the books into the air so she could catch her fall, but when she did they all landed back on top of her.

She laid on the ground for a while, trying to assess the damage of the books and her pain. Sighing heavily, she said "Great, now I have to clean those up too." She blew a loose bang out of her face.

Luckily no one around her in the other classrooms heard the commotion so she was able to sit back up before anyone came barging in and lecturing her about it. She began to pick up the books when she heard a rustling noise in the classroom. She paused, making sure she really did hear what she had just heard, and sure enough another shuffling noise came loud and clear from behind the door she had just closed.

"H-Hello?" She called out to the noise. "Is anyone there?" She stood up and walked over to the door, wrapping her hand around the door handle. "Hello?" She called again.

She turned the knob and threw the door open, like ripping a bandaid off. As far as she knew, she was the only one who was supposed to be in the room, and she sure didn't see anyone walk in after her. Unless they were there before her and was hiding when she came in, which probably meant they noticed her fall which made her slightly embarrassed. Anxious, she looked to the left of the room, then to the right. She even walked in because she couldn't believe it.

"It's empty…" Her jaw dropped and she began to shake a little. "But I was so sure I heard someone."

She decided her mind was just playing with her because the sunlight was coming in through the windows and one could clearly see she was alone but she noticed that the door was open, just like she left it. But someone could have easily come in or out that way. Not wanting to scare herself, she shrugged it off but before heading back into the lab closet, she noticed something shiny on the ground. _What's that?_ She thought to herself, before bending down to take a closer look. She picked the strange object up and took a closer look at it.

"That's weird, never seen this before." She closed one eye and used her open one to concentrate more on it.

"Maka!"

"WOAH-AHH!" Startled by the sudden loud voice she lost concentration and whatever balance she needed and let go of the object before falling on top of it. "Ow…" She groaned, frustrated to be back on the floor again in a falling matter.

"Maka! Oh, Maka?" Kim walked over to her as Maka was sitting back up, rubbing her back and arms.

"K-Kim!" She stuttered. "What are you doing here?" She secretly looked around for the strange object again, but it was nowhere to be found. _It must have rolled somewhere…_ Maka thought.

"You were taking a while so I came to see if you were alright." She tilted her head over as Maka stood up, brushing herself off. "What happened?"

Maka smiled. "Nothing! Nothing!" She tried to assure her. "I'm just being a little clumsy right now and dropped the books back in the closet."

Kim looked at her, not buying her story even though it was the truth, but decided to let it go. "Just as long as you're okay." She turned around and walked away from Maka. "Well I guess I'll-"

"Wait! Kim!" Maka stopped her. "Did you happen to pass by anyone on your way here?"

She looked up and thought about it for a while. She even grabbed her elbows and put one hand to her chin. "No, I don't think so." She replied. "Why?"

"I thought I heard someone in here earlier." Maka laughed as she confessed.

"Well that's a little scary." Kim laughed with her.

"Hey Maka you almost done? Don't keep us waiting!"The two of them looked out of the window to see Soul standing by his bike and Kid holding his skateboard. The two of them were looking up at Maka and Kim and waving their hands.

"It'd go a lot faster if you actually _helped_!" Maka shouted back at them, leaning her upper body outside the window.

"Why don't you go, I'll finish up for you." Kim offered with a smile.

"No, I couldn't!" Maka argued, bringing herself back into the room.

"It's not polite to keep people waiting, so I'll see you tomorrow!"

"O-Okay. Bye Kim!" She waved goodbye and fixed herself to walk out of the science lab.

Kim turned towards the closet door to finish the cleanup duty when something struck her. "Come to think of it, I _did_ see someone." She muttered to herself, then began to scream in the excitement that she remembered. "Hey Maka wait I did see someone! I saw…!" She turned around as fast as she could to see if Maka was there but saw that it was too late, she was already out of the classroom.

"…Soul." She finished her sentence nonchalantly, confused at how Maka left so quickly.

…

SWOOSH! "Yeah three pointer!" Soul cheered. "Come on Kid, is that all you got today?"

Kid smirked, dribbling another ball. "Not even close."

He dribbled past him and spun around to pass it to Maka when he was being blocked too much. She took one look at Soul charging after her to steal the ball and decided to wing it. She turned and shot the ball into the basket.

"Yay two points!" She cheered, jumping up and down.

The two boys applauded. "You're getting better every day." Kid complimented.

"I'm a great teacher so she better be!" Soul claimed, which earned him a light punch from each them.

_That's how it always was, the three of us would mostly spend our time hanging out on the basketball court. At first, I was reluctant because I had absolutely no idea how to play and was never really into sports, I would always watch them play one on one and I would read a book on the sidelines. But eventually they finally convinced me to try playing with them and ever since I've been slowly improving since they began to force teaching on me._

_Come on, they're my best friends they know my weaknesses!_

_But it wasn't all bad, I found the game to be a lot of fun and if I could choose one thing for all three of us to do, it would probably be to play basketball._

"Well soon, you'll have all summer to improve!" Kid told Maka, picking up the basketball and passing it to Soul.

"Just think about it! We can play like this every day, all summer long!" Soul was ecstatic, dribbling the ball and trying to get past Kid so he could make a basket. "And then we can all go see the summer fireworks!"

"Sounds a little repetitive, don't you think it might get boring?" Maka commented on the side.

"No way." Soul shot the ball from where he was standing and made it in. "This summer's gonna be the three of us, promise." He stated.

The three of them smiled and laughed with each other at his sudden remark.

_We'd been looking forward to the summer ever since the three of us became close. No matter how often we hung out we just couldn't get enough of each other, and having the entire summer to spend made everything all the more better. So you can imagine it was a topic we always talked about._

"So you know what happened to me yesterday?" Maka began the conversation, grabbing their ball and then passing it to Soul to start the game again. "I didn't get my candy bar! My idiot papa ate it before I got home." She sighed, catching the ball that Kid had passed to her. "And I was saving it as a special treat too." She passed it to Soul.

Soul dribbled past Kid and shot another three pointer. "So what're you gonna do about it?"

Maka got the ball again and dribbled it, walking closer to the net. "What _can_ I do about it? He already ate the stupid thing." She shot for the basket but it bounced off the rim. She sighed and walked off the court. "I think I'm done for today, I'll see you guys tomorrow." She propped up her bike and got on it.

"Later Maka!" The two boys shouted back before continuing a one-on-one match.

She rode her bike away from the park with the court and headed home. She didn't really have anything on her mind, so her bike ride was pretty smooth and careless, like it always was. To her it was just a usual day. She made her way to a hill. It was a street with a lot of shops and it was the kind where no cars were allowed onto it because of the steepness of the hill and the numerous amount of people that would constantly walk in the streets to go from shop to shop. At the bottom of the hill were train tracks perpendicular to the hill street, and at the same times every day the bars would come down and the bells would ring, notifying all the pedestrians who needed to cross it that a train was coming.

She rode down the hill every day to get home and rode up it every day to get to school, so this time was ordinary, nothing special about it. She nearly ran over a mother and her son going down the long hill, that's how fast she was going.

"Hey watch where you're going kid!" The mother yelled at her.

"Sorry!" Maka turned her head back to apologize.

"Mama look! The bars are coming down!" The son told his mother, getting excited by the lights and bells of the railroad crossing like it was some sort of light show or something.

"What?" Maka turned back around to see the pedestrians stopped before the tracks, letting the bars come down in front of them. She thought hey, no problem, she'd just push the lever and brake the bike.

It didn't work.

"Oh crap!" Maka panicked, violently squeezing the lever over and over again, but to no avail because it wasn't connected to the brake anymore and her bike was increasing speed rather than slowing down. She put her foot down on the ground to try and stop her bike with feet, but she was going so fast her shoe ended up getting thrown off her foot and it flew back behind her, and she only had one shoe on. She turned back to see where it went and saw that her shoe had somehow hit the mother she previously passed.

She turned around, the bars were getting closer. And closer. And closer. "Stop! Stop! STOP!" She pleaded with her bike, and even got looks from the others standing by. They had to step aside so she wouldn't run over them.

"STOP! STOP!" She continued to scream.

The front of her tire collided with the bar. She was thrown into the air, along with her bike, flipping over the bike and into the air above the tracks, right in the train's path. It was barely a few feet away from her with no plans on stopping. The last thing she remembered was seeing the lights of the train become blindingly close. The last thing she realized was that she was practically upside down and if the train wasn't coming she would have fallen on her back onto the tracks after a complete 180 flipover. The last thing she heard was the deafening horn of the train.

The last thing she thought was…

_I'm going to die_.

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"So what're you gonna do about it?"

She felt something hit her torso, hard, and she fell onto her butt.

"Maka!"

_What's going on? _She thought. _Is this heaven? Hell?_ She opened her eyes and felt two sets of hands grab each of her arms and pull her up. She looked at the ground to see something orange and spherical in front of her. She looked to her right and saw white hair, then to her left and saw black hair. _No way, did they die too?_

"Hey, are you okay?" She heard one of their voices.

"W-What's going on? Where am I?" She asked, vision becoming clear and head hurting less.

"Woah, did I throw the ball to your head?" Soul laughed, thinking she was kidding.

"You were probably just excited about your three-pointer." Kid taunted him, giving him a light punch to his shoulder.

_No way, is this déjà vu? _Maka thought. "H-Hey! What time is it?" She grabbed Kid's wrist and looked at his watch. "5:41…" She mumbled. _Now way! This can't be! I was hit by the 6 o'clock train!_ _If I was hit…that is…_

"Maka, what's going on? You're starting to creep me out." Soul told her as she let go of Kid's wrist.

"Did that ball do any damage?" Kid asked, concerned.

She ignored their questions, lost in thought, and walked over to her bike. _Wait, my bike! It should've gotten destroyed!_ She ran over to it, Soul and Kid watching with eyebrows raised, and she clenched the brake lever on her handle.

And sure enough, it wasn't working.

"UGH WHAT'S GOING ON? THIS DOESN'T MAKE SENSE?" she shouted and grabbed her head, screaming in frustration. _Did I dream all that up?_

"I think she's lost it." Soul commented to Kid.

"Way to go you busted her up!" Kid nagged.

"Hey I didn't think I threw it _that_ hard!" He defended himself.

The two of them paused when they noticed movement out of the corners of their eyes. It was Maka and she was using her hands to push the bike with her hands, walking on her feet with it right beside her. She was leaving without saying goodbye to them?

"Why aren't you riding your bike?" Kid shouted.

"I-I'm too tired!" Maka replied uneasily.

"Geez, what's with her." The two of them said in unison, and then shrugged it off to start a one-on-one basketball game.

…

"Sounds to me like you just time leaped."

"Time leaped?"

The tall white-haired and red-eyed man who enjoyed wearing a suit took a sip of his coffee and smiled at the green eyed girl in front of him. "Yes, you heard me right."

_That's Wes Evans. He's known my papa since forever and I think of him as my uncle._

_Haha yeah, that's what I thought too when I first met Soul. I asked him if they were related, and he denied any relation to anyone named Wes, and Wes told me he doesn't know anyone by the name of Soul._

Maka had decided to go to her father's friend Wes for advice, being one of the rare normal people her father associated himself with and was practically like her uncle to her. In fact, that's what she preferred to call him. She had told him all about her day and how she had the strangest case of déjà vu which, to Wes, was actually her time traveling or something.

Wes was sitting in a chair across from the couch Maka was sitting on, holding a notebook in his hand and a pencil in the other, constantly scribbling something down, then erasing it, then scribbling in the notebook again. He was a violinist, but composed music for the piano too, and usually created songs where the two instruments played a duet together, although he confessed to Maka he didn't really know anyone who played the piano.

"What?" Maka asked, taking a sip of her own coffee.

"I've experienced it before." He wrote something down.

"Really? You have?" Maka shouted back almost immediately.

"Yes. I would sometimes wake up at about five in the morning on a Saturday, then fall back asleep and wouldn't wake up until four in the morning on Sunday, and I would think it was Saturday still and I just went back in time one hour when really it was Sunday."

Maka threw a nearby soft-cover book at Wes. "I'm not kidding! It wasn't like that!" She fumed at him, and he just laughed at her reaction. "I thought I died but then, somehow I was back a few minutes before the accident!"

"I'm joking, I'm joking, relax." Wes tried to calm her down. "But you really should consider time leaping."

She crossed her arms. "Everyone knows time travel isn't _real_." She stood up and headed towards the door. "But, thanks anyways uncle."

"Anytime Maka."

_**~THE NEXT DAY~**_

She woke up late again, and after having her dad fix the brake on her bike, she rode it again, heading towards school with lightning speed so she could get there on time. Back at home, she made found another candy bar and made sure that it was well hidden. Soon she arrived at the same spot, like every other day, she stopped peddling and cruised so she could slow her bike down. And at the same spot, like every other day, that same boy would ride his bike a little more than too closely to hers.

"Still no alarm clock?" Soul teased, laughing at startling her, which never got old even though he did it every day.

But instead of snapping her usual quick comebacks at him, she just stayed silent, not even letting a smile onto her face. Her mind was too deep in thought about yesterday, and she probably didn't even notice Soul was talking to her. She just continued spacing out and staring at the ground barely a foot away from her tire. She'd probably run into something and not even know about it.

"Maka, is everything okay? You've been acting weird since I hit you with that ball." He stopped laughing and his tone was more concerned. "If you're hurt I can take you to the hospital we can get you-"

"I'm fine." She interrupted. She stared for a few more seconds before looking up at Soul with a gleaming smile on her face. "Sorry for worrying you." She assured him.

He still didn't buy it, but he didn't want to pester her about it any longer, knowing her short temper, and if she didn't want to talk about whatever it was, he wouldn't bother her with it. So he decided to shrug it off and act as if nothing happened. She did the same thing, they talked and joked along with Kid once they entered the school like they always did, like it was just another day of school. And that's what it was. The day continued on like a regular day, and when Maka took her class in the science lab, she looked for the strange object but still couldn't find it.

At the end of the day, since she wasn't on cleanup duty for the rest of the week, she went to the court with Soul and Kid. The rest of the day went without a hitch, she could even say everything was back to normal and that whatever happened was just a one time thing. When she got home, making sure to walk her bike down the hill instead of riding it even if her brakes were working fine, she headed straight for the kitchen to look for her candy bar she had found and saved again.

Of course, it wasn't there.

"Papa!" She yelled, but he was already gone for his late night rendezvous at a nearby bar, so it was pointless. She sighed, soothing herself. "I'll just go to the store and buy some more, and make sure to keep it in my room." She planned for herself, and went back out of the house.

She went to the store and bought her candy, then put it in the basket on the front of her bike. She decided since she didn't have much homework, she would take the scenic route, riding on the sidewalk by the shore of a lake nearby. There was grass and a small beach by the lake too, and the sidewalk was the farthest away from it, but the scene was still great. Since it was getting late the sun started to set which gave a very golden look to the sky.

As she rode her bike across the large and long sidewalk her thoughts fell onto what Wes said, about time leaping. He told her that he thought everytime she leaped, she could travel anywhere in time. The thought really wasn't that bad, and was rather more attractive to her. She shook her head. _Time travel? That's impossible. _She thought to herself.

But she _really_ wanted her candy bar, and she _really_ didn't want to spend all her allowance on more candy bars, even though she already did that. She stopped her bike and put it down, walking towards the wooden dock where people stood to fish. It was open so people could sit on the edge and swing their legs back and forth, which some people were doing right now. She stood at the edge of the dock and looked down into the ocean.

"Should I…?" She pondered. "Aw, what the heck. It's worth a shot isn't it?" She figured that since she's a good swimmer and it wasn't that deep, it really wouldn't matter if it worked or not. She took a few steps back before getting a running start and then took one giant leap off the edge of the dock, getting some looks from others.

She looked down and saw the water beneath her.

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"If you want a snack Stein, I think there's a candy bar in the pantry. It's my daughter's but I'm sure she won't mind."

Maka's head didn't hurt as much and her vision cleared much faster than the first time. She looked at the clock. "4:37…" She said, then gasped. "I was playing basketball at this time!" She whispered, and looked outside the window and it was no longer the sunset she remembered seeing but a bright zenith of the sun.

She heard footsteps walking down the stairs and remembered what her dad's voice said, then quickly looked into her pantry and of course, it was there. Back when she last saw it, coming home after hanging out with Soul and Kid, it wasn't there. She grabbed the bar when Stein entered the kitchen and had a huge look of surprise on his face.

"Oh, Maka. When did you get home?" He asked her, and then Spirit showed up behind him soon.

"Maka darling! You're home early."

She pulled the candy bar closer to her chest and squinted at her papa, giving him a glare. "_No one_ is eating my candy bar." She took a giant, defiant bite out of it and then trudged up to her room, leaving the two men dumbfounded.

She closed the door to her room behind her and fell to her knees, shaking. "Oh my gosh! I-I time leaped? It's real…?" She paused for a while, holding her breath, and then burst into a fit of giggles. "No way! I can time leap! I can time leap!" She jumped up and down in excitement and then took her joyous celebration to the shower.

After her shower and finished her homework, she got a call from Soul.

"_Hey, you didn't show up for basketball today. You sure you're alright?"_

She sighed. "This again?" She chuckled at his concern. "I just came home to stop my papa from eating my candy bar again."

He laughed too. _"And how'd you manage that?"_

She lay on her back on her bed and hung her head upside down off the edge of her bed. "I just took it before he could get it. Next time I'm hiding them in my room." She resolved. _Or rather, I time leaped into the past. _She thought.

"_Congratulations, so you actually did something about it." _He laughed, teasing her.

"That better be a compliment Soul!" She argued back at him.

"_If that's what you want." _He told her, laughing. After a few seconds of fun his tone turned more serious. _"Hey Maka, if there's something on your mind you know you can always come to me or Kid right?"_

Maka was silent for a while and sat up, now sitting cross-legged on her bed. She took a big silent pause, and then responded in a quiet voice a little louder than a whisper. "Yeah, I do."

"_Just making sure." _

She wanted to stop the conversation right there, before it proceeded any further. "I have to go Soul. I'll see you tomorrow."

"_Later."_

Tired and exhausted, she threw herself back to hang over the edge of her bed upside down again.

_**~A WEEK LATER~**_

"So you're having fun with it right?" Wes asked Maka, sitting in his chair, continuing to scribble what Maka could understand as nonsense, into his notebook.

She was jumping up and down and running all around his little room. "Are you kidding? I'm having the time of my life!" After jumping on the couch a little bit she landed on her but and sat down on it. "I don't have to worry about forgetting something because I can just go back in time and get it! And if I use my allowance up I can just go back in time to allowance day and I'll get back my money! And when I hang out with my friends it'll feel like it lasts forever because I can just keep going back to before we go home!" She laughed so hard she held her stomach. "I'm having so much fun I'm getting abs from laughing about it so much! Oh, and if you forget anything, just let me know and I'll time leap and get it for you." She winked at Wes.

"Well I'm glad to see you aren't using it for anything significant." He stated sarcastically, chuckling.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Maka questioned him.

"Nothing too important, really." He jotted something down and put his pen in his mouth to ponder over what to write next. "I'm just saying, don't you think you should use it to make some changes for the better? This is quite an incredible gift you have, I'd assume someone like you wouldn't waste it on such trivial things."

"Well you'd do the same if you were the one time leaping instead of sitting and writing in your notebook all the time." She defended. "By the way, what _are_ you doing in that?" She leaned over to try and take a peek at his notebook, but he held it closer to his chest and wiggled his finger back and forth.

"No peeking." He said with a smile on his face. "It's a new piece I'm working on called 'Meditation of Souls.'" He told her.

"Cool! Can I hear you play it?" Maka asked excitedly.

He brought the notebook away from his chest once she sat back down and continued to scratch symbols onto the lines. "No previews until it's done." He said apologetically. "But you could try to time leap into the future to go to the concert hall, and _maybe_ I'll be there."

Maka crossed her arms. "Then it wouldn't be a surprise."

Wes chuckled. "Yes, you're right." He looked at Maka and lowered his tone a little. "But when you time leap, just keep in mind that you might be hurting some people." His smile had vanished, and he spoke absolutely seriously.

"O-Okay."

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About an hour after talking with Wes, she began her walk home. She had decided to skip playing basketball with her friends so she could vent about how happy she was to have received such good fortune the past week to Wes, figuring that she could just time leap into the past and play with them again. _No, then my whole conversation with Wes wouldn't have happened. _She told herself. _And I don't know if I can repeat everything I said. _

She decided to walk over to the courts, leaving her bike at home that day. Hopefully, Soul and Kid were still on the court and playing one-on-one, and then she could join after apologizing for being late. To her luck, the two of them were still on the court, wearing the loose tank tops they usually wore underneath their uniform top, after taking it off no doubt from the heat and sweating. She was about to walk up to them when she heard a rustling noise and a shushing sound and turned her head to see three girls hiding behind a bush and a tree next to the court, obviously watching her two friends.

"Carpe diem Liz! It's _now_ or never!" Said a blonde girl who looked younger than the girl called Liz. Maka recognized the younger one as Patty.

"_Today's_ the day! Now go you might not get a chance like this again!" A brunette pushed Liz's shoulders. Maka remembered her name was Jacqueline.

Maka hid behind a tree and watched the scene unfold before her. She saw Liz walk out of the bushes and up to Kid and Soul. The two of them noticed the girl approach them and Kid caught the basketball when it bounced to him after making another shot, and when he turned to look at Liz he put the ball under his arm in between his waist and elbow. She looked at the other two girls, who watched the scene carefully and holding each other, it looked like they were praying or something.

Maka looked back over to the court and saw Soul, Kid, and Liz talking with each other. A few seconds into the conversation Soul walked away and began to shoot free throws by himself. Liz started blushing and fidgeting violently. Maka sighed, _I wish I could hear what they were saying_ she thought to herself. Suddenly, Liz bowed down and ran back towards her friends. She looked a little sad, was she…crying? As soon as the three girls left the court, Maka finally emerged from her hiding spot and walked onto the court, but she had no intention to join playing the game today. Soul and Kid turned around and paused their game yet again.

"Maka there you are! I thought you said you weren't coming today?" Kid asked her.

She smiled. "Y-Yeah well, not anymore."

Soul took a shot at a three pointer. "Ngh, so what made you change your mind?" He groaned, and the ball went in.

"That's not important." Maka waved a hand up and down, shooing the importance of her answer away. "So Kid, I saw that girl walk up to you. What'd she say?" She asked him as Soul continued playing by himself.

Kid signaled Soul to pass him the ball and caught it, then began to dribble it in place. "She just wanted to know if I was going out with _you_."

Maka laughed. "What? We're not going out!" She shouted, amused.

"That's what I told her." Kid agreed.

She knew where this conversation was headed. "_And_ anything else?" She pursued.

"Not much really." He turned around to face the hoop, where Soul was standing underneath it to catch the ball. "Says she has a crush or something." Kid jumped up, and threw the ball into the net. "Then she asked me out."

"Are you serious? Way to go!" Soul's tone was congratulating. He caught Kid's ball then started dribbling it. He had a huge smile on his face that looked more like he was proud his friend was getting a girl.

"That's great! So what'd you say?" Maka congratulated him as well.

"Turned her down of course." He replied nonchalantly.

She lightly punched him on the arm. "Ugh, meanie! That took guts to ask you out!" She defended Liz.

"Why'd you turn her down man? I'd kill for a girl like that." Soul commented, tossing the ball to Maka, who just held it since she didn't feel like playing or learning anything about basketball right now. Kid's love life was too juicy at that moment for her to think about that stuff. So she passed the ball back over to Kid.

He spun the ball on his finger. "Well if I said yes, then it'd just be you two, and you wouldn't have anyone to kick your ass in basketball." He told Soul, and when he tried to steal the ball from him, Kid avoided him and shot a three pointer, making it in.

"At least you didn't say you weren't interested." Maka smiled. "I thought you liked that kind of girl."

"Yeah Kid, isn't she your type?" Soul asked him, grabbing the basketball and then walking over so the three of them were standing around and talking with each other.

"What? I don't have a _type_." Kid defended. "And liking her or not has nothing to do with my answer." He continued to state casually.

They walked home together, and Soul was the only one who brought a bike, so he pushed it alongside him so he could walk with his other two friends. It was just before dinnertime, so the sunset was at its darkest but there was still no sign of navy blue taking over the sky soon. Maka and Soul kept pestering Kid about how he should have taken the girl's feelings into consideration or that she could start hanging out with the three of them if they ever started dating. They reached a four way intersection a few minutes later and stopped right in the middle of it, so the conversation didn't last that long because they had to separate here.

"Alright, whatever you say. But don't come crying to me about dating that girl later." Soul teased. He was sitting on his bike now.

"Can we please just drop it now?" Kid told them, not in an irritated tone but mostly in his monotone voice he usually had. He shoved his hands in his pockets and waved goodbye to them before turning around and taking one of the streets home.

"Later." "See ya." The other two said goodbye in unison, as Kid disappeared from sight.

Soul grabbed one of the handlebars, then turned his head to look at Maka, who had already turned around and taken a separate street to head home. "Hey, where's your bike?"

Maka stopped walking and turned around. "Oh, I just left it at home."

Soul adjusted his body. "Get on, I'll double you."

She smiled excitedly. "You'll take me home?" Maka ran up to his bike and got on. "Sweet!" She exclaimed.

She held onto him when she sat on the back of his bike. His seat was long enough to hold two people and he had _**pegs**_in the back tires too so when Maka bent her knees far enough she rested her toes on it. She wasn't really bothered by the fact she was holding onto him because she never saw either one of her guy friends in a romantic way. Same with him, he didn't really mind having her hold onto him because they were just really good friends. That's how comfortable all three of them were with each other.

Soul took the scenic route back to her house, which was the same one by the lake side and the grass and the sidewalk Maka had taken a week ago when she jumped off the dock. That's why she didn't bring her bike, because she thought she left it on the dock but she forgot she time traveled and that it was still in her garage, and ended up leaving without it. There were still some people out and about, going for a run or walking their pets, even tossing a frisbee or a baseball around. It was a long day for her, so for the most part of the ride she remained silent, completely exhausted. He was tired too, so he didn't mind the comfortable quietness that enveloped the two of them. Kid was already at home by that time.

"So do you honestly think Kid wasn't interested?" Maka brought up the conversation casually.

"Probably, the guy usually means what he says." Soul replied.

"Aw, I thought he kind of liked her." She admitted with a little disappointment. "Looked to me like they hit it off."

"You know him, he's such a nerd he won't show his emotions like that too easily. Likes to keep us thinking."

She laughed. "Haha yeah, probably part of his masterplan to make us use our brains a little." She stopped laughing when it became awkward and uneasy. Then her tone became serious. "I know it's kind of selfish, but I'm kind of glad he turned her down."

"Oh yeah, why's that?"

She leaned back into the chair, throwing her head back and arching her back and stared at the sky. "Because if he did then he'd start hanging out with her more than us, and giving her special treatment." She said. "For some reason I felt that it would always just be the three of us. Hanging, laughing, playing basketball together. It just wouldn't be the same without him."

"You've got a point there." He agreed. "But you make it sound like we're all going to have some three way marriage someday." He chuckled.

She pinched his arm. "You know what I mean!"

They continued riding the long path as Maka began to soak in the situation. She was doing some unnecessary thinking, and it bothered her she had so much on her mind. The breeze was nice and she took a deep breath in. Soul looked at her calm composure out of the corner of his eye. The second time he tried to get a better view of her he turned his neck ever so slightly. The third time he moved an annoying piece of hair out of his way but didn't even bother turning around.

"Maka…"

"Hm?"

"What do you say… wanna go out?"

He asked it very quietly. If she didn't know him so well, she would assume that he wasn't being ferreal about it but she _did_ know him so well. Her breath stopped and she took a small gasp in. Her eyes widened a little and she felt as if time had stopped completely, which was ironic for her. Slowly, but dramatically, she pulled her upper body from being parallel to the ground up so now she was sitting up straight, and looking straight into Soul's back instead of up at the sky.

"Stop." She demanded sincerely. "Stop for a second."

He sqeezed the brake levers until the bike came to a halt. He had stopped it right by the lake.

"What was that?" She asked. "Why'd you say that? Where's that coming from?" She said, panicked.

He kept his casual tone, trying to coolly pass it off. "You were wondering what'd it be like if Kid got a girlfriend. I mean, I'm not ugly, am I?" He uneasily chuckled quietly.

She was caught way off guard, and she was surprised she wasn't speechless. She had never been in this situation before. Her and Soul maybe, possibly being more than friends _never ever_ crossed her mind and she _never ever_ expected it, especially not when they were talking about what they were previously discussing. Surprisingly though, she was able to keep calm.

"Are you being serious?" She asked him softly, making sure it wasn't some sort of joke, since he wasn't usually serious about things.

"Dead."

She didn't reply. She _couldn't_ reply. _How am I supposed to respond to that?_ She thought to herself. This was Soul, she couldn't be serious with him because they were always joking around each other and acting playfully. She kept her silence because she was thinking about how to react, but then he started moving the bike again. "Hang on, wait a minute!" She asked him to stop again.

He groaned, a little frustrated after she practically just turned him down. "What is it this time can we just go?" He turned his whole upper body around to face her, but the back of his seat was empty. "Maka?" He looked around, looking for her, being the only person on the bike now. "Where'd she go?" He asked himself.

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"Alright, whatever you say. But don't come crying to me about dating that girl later."

"Can we please just drop it now?"

"Later." "See ya."

"Hey, where's your bike?"

This was the beginning of where Maka wanted to change how the conversation ended. "It's back at my house." She decided to just go with the flow for now, she could always just time leap back in case she messes up again, right?

Soul adjusted his body. "Get on, I'll double you."

She gulped loudly before reluctantly getting on.

…

"Man, I can't believe Kid got a girl before I did. Little player beat me to it." He groaned as he rode the two of them back to the sidewalk by the lake. The scene was repeating itself, but the conversation began a different way. _Okay, good start_. Maka told herself.

"It's not like he decided to go out with her. He said he turned her down." She replied.

He kept the subtle frown on his face. "Yeah for now, but if he changes his mind and ends up dating he'd always pick her over us."

Maka laughed uneasily. "You can't be sure about that." She defended Kid.

He ignored her and continued his rant, still frustrated about Kid being asked out before him. "Ugh man, without Kid it wouldn't be the same. I can't play one-on-one with you! Oh, uh, no offense." He quickly added to save himself from any beatings he might receive.

"Well why don't you just wait until he actually _decides_ to go out with her before you start worrying about it." She started to nag him. Soul could tell she was just a little offended from the sudden change in the tone of her voice.

He chuckled at her reaction. "You've got a point, there's not much we can do to change his mind if he ever does decide to say yes." He turned his head around and smirked. "So anyways, why don't you go out with me?"

"U-Uh, why are we talking about this?" She shouted into the air before jumping off the bike.

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"Yeah for now, but if he changes his mind and ends up dating he'd always pick her over us."

Maka quickly changed the subject as they continued to ride along that same lakeside path. "Hey have I ever told you how much of an idiot my papa is?"

"Uh, I was talking about Kid, in case you didn't notice." Soul attempted to get the conversation back on the topic he wanted to talk about.

"Oh forget about that let's talk about my papa!" She kept trying to convince him.

"Well if Kid finds a girlfriend…" He ignored her attempts.

"He's such an idiot sometimes!"

"So anyways…!"

"Like I said let's talk about my papa!" She even added an uneasy chuckle.

"DO YOU WANT TO GO OUT WITH ME?" He shouted.

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"Alright, whatever you say. But don't come crying to me about dating that girl later."

"Can we please just drop it now?"

This time, before Kid left to go home and they said goodbye to each other, Maka sighed, giving up, and began walking home first, leaving the other two in the intersection.

"Hey Maka, where are you going? I'll take you home." Soul offered.

"No thanks, I'm fine." She said, completely worn out.

"Come on what's the matter?"

She stayed silent and just continued to walk down her own separate path, slumping her shoulders. She was definitely going to pass out when she got home, maybe after a quick candy bar.

"What's her problem?" Kid asked. Soul biked closer to him and kicked him in the shin. "Ow!"

"It's all your fault." He scolded.

"I didn't do anything!" Kid defended.

…

Instead of heading home like she planned, she returned back to Wes. It became dark outside and her only lights were the stars, the moon, and the streetlights that led the way. Wes was surprised to see her back again, and after asking her what happened or if her father would be worried, he decided to let her stay for a little bit longer. Maka told him everything that had happened after she left earlier. She told him about Kid getting asked out and how she time leaped again and again because Soul had surprisingly asked her the same thing. Wes continued working on his music and Maka decided to entertain herself with a swivel chair while she told her story, spinning around and around and around, too preoccupied with what she was doing and with what she was thinking to get dizzy.

"I thought that you liked Soul." He jotted something down. "I remember you saying once that when you met he was rough around the edges so you decided to become closer friends with him to keep him away from the bad side."

"Yeah I did say something like that." She agreed.

"So why pretend it never happened? Why not just go out with him?" Wes offered his advice.

Maka stopped spinning around so she could put both of her hands up and shake them in front of her in protest, her tone sounding defiant. "N-No way! Not happening!"

"How come?"

"I can't picture Soul and I being anything more than friends."

"Well if it doesn't work out then just go back to being friends. I'm sure you can handle that."

"Thanks, but no thanks. Things just wouldn't be the same even if we both tried our hardest." She argued. "Me and Soul won't happen, _ever_!"

Wes paused his writing and looked straight into Maka's face and put his cheek in one of his hands. "Well if that's the case, I must say I feel kind of sorry for Soul. After all the guts it must have taken him to work up the courage to ask you." Maka gasped slightly, taken by surprise Wes had said what she told Kid earlier, as if using it against her.

"But then again, I suppose he won't even know that he did."

Maka frowned, knowing that he had a point. A _very_ good point. _That's right, I never even realized I went back that far._ She sighed in defeat.

Wes could tell that he had given her enough to think about with his 'wise words of wisdom' so he decided to tell her, before she had a chance to respond, that she should probably be heading back home before it got too late. She took one more spin around his swivel chair and stood up to bow down to him in gratitude before following his suggestion to return home.

When she got home she decided to take a bath instead of a shower, because she wanted to just relax in some bubbles instead of just getting clean. When she lifted her arm up to scrub it, she noticed a strange symbol on her arm. She wondered what it was and when she took a closer look at it, the symbol turned into a number. It read…

50?

Or 05?

"I wonder what it could mean." She pondered over it for a while. "I don't remember getting a tattoo."

_**~THE NEXT DAY~**_

It's in the middle of the school day, and everything had gone as usual. Maka rode her bike to school like usual, completely going about her day as if she had no memory of Soul asking her out. The rest of the day passed smoothly and now it was lunchbreak. Maka, Kim, and Tsubaki were all sitting down under a large tree right in front of the soccer field, watching the game that the boys were playing and eating their lunch. Two of the boys among the soccer game were Kid and Soul. This was usual, the boys at their school preferred to challenge each other to sports, like all guys, and then after they finished they would quickly scarf down as much food as they could.

Another boy that the three of them picked out was Tsubaki's boyfriend Black Star. Kim and Maka would constantly tell her how jealous they were that she had such a stable relationship with someone. Maka even went as far as asking her how it felt when he asked her out, trying to compare the way she remembered Soul asking.

"He didn't really ask, it was more like a demand." She admitted cheerfully.

"What? You're kidding?" Kim replied. She was hoping to hear a long, romantic story.

"And you said yes?" Maka asked, bewildered.

She laughed at their reactions. "He's not really the kind of person to get all mushy about things and he's pretty up front about things, you know straight forward, so it was the sweetest thing he could possibly do. To be honest I'm not sure he could get more romantic than that." She took a bite out of her lunch.

"To think you can put up with _that_ Tsubaki, I'm amazed." Kim complimented her. "_And_ you're okay with him not being romantic, I would die if my boyfriend sucked at being chivalrous to me all the time."

"Well, I guess you really are the only perfect person for him." Maka commented, taking a sip of her drink.

"I wouldn't go that far…" Tsubaki uneasily laughed, embarrassed by her friends' compliments.

Another few minutes passed as all of their mouths were full eating their lunches. The weather was perfect outside, so they were soaking that in too. The boys were screaming at each other in a joking way and messing around, roughhousing and all, and they couldn't help but laugh at how guys could be such guys. But that's what makes them so lovable right? Kim's eyes landed on one person in particular, and watched as he, and a bunch of other guys for that matter, took his shirt off because he was sweating so much. Even though the other boys around him did the same it was only that person she looked at.

"Hey, you guys know how Soul just transferred to our school in the middle of last semester?" She asked, Maka and Tsubaki nodded their heads. "I heard that he'd been bouncing around different schools before this."

"Yeah apparently." Tsubaki added.

"Do you think the rumors of him living overseas is true?" Kim asked the randomly curious question.

"I doubt it." Maka stated nonchalantly, taking a bite out of her lunch. "He sucks at languages." She said with her mouth full. "No chance."

"No huh?" Kim pondered. "Still, I wonder what happened to him at his last school."

"Who knows?" Maka stated. "Guy's a complete mystery."

"Well why don't _you_ ask him?" Tsubaki told Kim.

She chuckled. "Please, I don't even have his number."

"So? He's in our class. You've got plenty of chances." Maka told her.

"But you two are such close friends!" Kim protested.

Maka took another bite. "Nah, I wouldn't ask him something like that." She took a sip. "No one really knows anything about him past his first day here, and he doesn't like to talk about it, so me and Kid don't bring it up in front of him. His life's a total secret."

"Really? You're kidding?" Kim's eyes sparkled. "That's so cool, he's mysterious!" She began to admire him.

"You sound interested in him." Tsubaki teased, winking at Kim.

"W-What? Please, he doesn't even know I exist." She tried to hide away a blush as she silently sipped her drink.

"Sure he does, he sees you everyday." Maka encouraged her.

After lunch Tsubaki parted with them to go and finish up some homework, so it was just Maka and Kim now. Soul and Kid had also finished playing their game of soccer, but the two girls didn't know. Maka and Kim spent the rest of lunch period walking around outside the school as they continued their conversation from before.

"I'm just saying, if you want to get questions answered, ask them yourself." Maka told Kim.

"That sounds really philosophical of you, I'm surprised. You feeling okay?" Kim chuckled.

"Phila who?"

She laughed even harder. "My point _exactly_." Kim stopped walking and Maka followed in her suit. "Hey, look over there."

Maka's eyes followed Kim's gaze to see where she was looking, or rather what she was talking about. "It's Soul. What's he doing?"

He was standing in front of four guys with his hands in his pockets and his shoulders slumped over, like he was doing something he was really reluctant to do. One boy he was talking to was sitting on the ground and the other three were standing up over him, and it looked like they were arguing with Soul. She recognized the three standing boys as Ox, Harvar, and Kilik. The two girls watched as he suddenly took his shoe off and threw it in Harvar's. After seeing this Maka became determined to find out what was going on and started stomping towards Soul, ushering Kim to follow her.

On her way to him the three standing boys yelled something that sounded like revenge and walked away angrily. Soul bent down and started talking to the boy on the ground, and he stood up and bowed to him multiple times before grabbing his backpack and scurrying away. When they caught up with him he was hopping around on one foot trying to find his lost shoe that he had thrown at them. Maka walked over and put her hands on her hips, Kim finally catching up to her and catching her breath.

"What was _that_?" She demanded.

He gave her a strange look as he found his shoe and started hopping towards it. "Oh that? Some guys were picking on Hiro."

"So you decided to step in?" Maka nagged.

"Well why not? Poor guy was getting beaten up." He said nonchalantly. "They needed to get what they deserved, they were calling him names."

Maka crossed her arms and thinned her eyes. "You're always calling _me_ stupid."

Soul chuckled and picked up his shoe, putting it on. "Yeah, but I say it out of love."

Silence. Maka uncrossed her arms and her face became blank as she let them fall to her sides. She started remembering when he had asked her out, even though technically it didn't happen since she time leaped so far back, but the fact that he still feels that way about her haunted her and poked at her. She looked away from him and turned her back away from him.

His smile went away. "Come on, where's your comeback? You're leaving me in the cold here." She stayed silent. "Hey, what's gotten into you lately? You've been acting kind of weird, don't you think so Diehl?" He asked Kim, hoping for some backup.

"O-Oh, uh, yes. Yeah I guess so." She stuttered her reply.

Soul raised his eyebrow at Kim. "Why the stiff talk?" He asked her with a sincere tone.

"S-Sorry, it's just, I haven't spoken to you much before." She replied, surprised that he actually knew her name.

Maka walked away before she could hear anymore of their conversation. She took one quick glance back and saw the two of them were having a conversation together, and laughing together about it. She didn't know what they were laughing about, but they were getting along. She figured, that since she believed her and Soul would never be more than just friends, because that's all she saw the two of them as, then Kim might as well have him since she likes him so much.

…

The next few days, Maka spent most of them avoiding Soul, and unintentionally avoiding Kid since the two of them were always together. When she would turn a corner and see that Soul was on the other side, she would quickly turn around and find some other detour to take, which usually resulted in being late to class. In the morning for homeroom, she would completely ignore him and would leave the room as quickly as possible before he could strike any conversation with her.

Soul began getting frustrated, wanting to talk to Maka since they were friends and he had no idea why she was avoiding him, he even started searching for her instead of just wondering where she was. When he walked in the classroom to look for her she hid underneath the desk and would sneak out before he could spot her. One day, she saw Kid and Soul leaving school together, and she knew they were headed toward the courts, but she avoided them and went straight home anyways.

A day later, Kid was already at the basketball courts playing by himself when Soul arrived on his bike. "Hey! Maka!" He screamed, hoping she would answer.

"She's not here, _again_." Kid told him.

"But she always meets us here." He looked around. "Geez, where could she be?"

"She hasn't met us in this court all week. Something happen?" Kid asked him, shooting a basket.

"What? No, nothing at all." Soul got off his bike and walked onto the court.

"Well you must've said something that pissed her off."

"I didn't do anything to her." He quickly defended.

"You better not have made fun of her body." Kid nagged. "You know she's self conscious."

"I didn't say anything!" He raised his voice louder and Kid raised an eyebrow at him. "I didn't!" Kid tossed him the basketball and Soul caught it. "At least… I don't think I did."

"Pass it back." Kid told him, talking about the basketball.

Soul lifted the ball up as if he was going to throw it back, but then gave up and brought it down. "Ugh, I can't pass good when I'm thinking." He started dribbling the ball in place. "Damn…" He muttered under his breath. "I just don't get it!" He shouted before passing the ball back to Kid, who continued playing by himself after he caught the ball because he decided not to bother his friend while he was thinking.

Soul took out his cell phone and started typing on it.

…

Maka lay on her stomach on her bed, reading a magazine. There wasn't much for her to do at home since she never spent so much time at home, but lately she had because she tried to avoid Soul, hoping to get his mind off of her.

Her cell phone rang.

"A text?" Maka asked herself, and rolled over on her bed to reach her cell phone, then rolled back onto her stomach. She opened her phone and started reading it.

'_Something great just happened!'_

"It's Kim." Maka said.

'_What happened?'_ She texted back.

A few hours later and Maka had finished showering. She walked back into her room with a towel, drying her hair. She sat on her bed and stared at her cell phone, which hadn't rung in those hours.

"Wonder what her news was."

_**~THE NEXT DAY~**_

It's Friday, and it's their lunch period. Tsubaki and Maka walked over to Kim, who was still sitting in her desk.

"Hurry up! We'd better get some before they run out." Maka smiled, talking about a pastry their school sold in the cafeteria.

"Actually…I'm not feeling all that well today." Kim replied, with a very jittery expression on her face. She looked nervous.

"Did you want to go to the nurse?" Tsubaki asked her.

"Oh, n-no thanks I'll be fine!" She assured the two of them.

Letting her be, Maka and Tsubaki agreed to give her some time alone and left the classroom to have lunch. After they left Kim took out two lunchboxes from her bag and placed them on her desk, looking at them intensely. She was so nervous that she spent all her energy trying to stop herself from shaking. After her two friends completely left the room, Soul walked in with his hands in his pockets, unknowing that Maka and Tsubaki were in there, and made his way to Kim's desk. She looked up at him when he stood next to her.

"You ready?" He asked her sincerely.

"Uh y-yeah." She stood up out of her desk and picked up the two boxes.

"I gotta say, I was surprised when you asked me to have lunch with you." He chuckled and put a hand behind his head to scratch it. "Never thought you had it in you."

She laughed a little. "Had what in me?" The two of them walked together out of the room. "Well when you texted me yesterday asking if I knew what was going on with Maka, that surprised me too. I didn't think you had my number." She confessed with a smile.

"Yeah, Tsubaki gave it to me and said 'do it before it's too late!'" He laughed. "Whatever that means."

"S-She did not!" Kim squealed. "I'll kill her!" She stated with determination.

"Why? What she did was useful don't you think?" He told her. "I mean if it wasn't for her we probably wouldn't have become friends."

Kim blushed. She knew that Tsubaki realized she kind of liked him and gave him her number in hopes that he'd text her. She blushed even more to know that her plan actually worked, and without Tsubaki she wouldn't have had the guts to ask Soul to lunch when their conversation went from talking about what could be going on with Maka to talking about everything they had in common.

"Oh wow, is this box for me?"

"Y-Yeah."

"Gee thanks!"

Maka and Tsubaki ate lunch together under their usual tree, only this time without Kim. They didn't talk about it too much because they were sure if she said she was fine, then it was nothing to worry about. They began talking about their plans for the weekend and about school. It was the same weather as usual, and the guys were playing soccer with each other, as usual. However the two of them noticed only Kid and Black Star, Soul was nowhere to be seen.

"So what do you think that was all about?" Tsubaki asked Maka, taking a bite out of her lunch.

"You mean Kim?" Maka took a bite out of her own lunch. "I'm sure it's nothing."

Tsubaki's eyes wandered around as she was planning on answering with another comment, but then she spotted something and decided to change her response. "Well _that_ doesn't look like nothing."

"Huh?" Maka followed Tsubaki's gaze and saw Kim and Soul eating together by another tree. They were sitting on the same blanket, and talking and laughing with each other. Seeing it made Maka said a little bit, but she decided to ignore it.

"They sure look like they like each other." Tsubaki commented.

"Yeah, I guess." She stated in an uncaring tone. For some reason, seeing the two of them together didn't go well with her stomach.

"Is something wrong Maka?"

She got up and fixed her skirt. "It's nothing." She turned around. "I need to use the bathroom, I'll be back."

"O-Okay…"

…

Maka splashed water onto her face, and after drying her face with a towel looked at herself in the mirror.

"Sheesh, what's wrong with me." She commented to herself.

"_Come on! It's over here! This way!"_

"_Oh boy this is gonna be good!"_

She heard the distant voices and looked saw a few students run past her from the reflection of the mirror. So she turned around and saw that they were turning a corner and soon a crowd started gathering into a circle. Curious as to what the commotion was, she followed some students and made her way through the crowd, pushing shoulders and shoving a little bit to make her way to the front of the crowd. The students left a large amount of space around the small group of people in the center.

It was Hiro. And he was getting revenge. He had a fire extinguisher in his hand and was spraying Ox, Harvar, and Kilik with the white foam that came out of it.

"Knock it off Hiro!" Ox yelled.

"Yeah man, stop it! What's wrong with you?"

Hiro screamed at them. "Why should I? You didn't stop when I asked you to!"

Maka sighed, although her three classmates were getting what they deserved, she believed Hiro shouldn't be getting revenge, especially when it drags on this long. "Hiro stop! Put it down!" She yelled over at him.

Everyone paused, and turned to look at Maka. Hiro stopped spraying the extinguisher and dramatically turned to glare at her, while the other three guys took the chance to run away because Hiro had gone crazy.

"Oh crap…" She muttered to herself.

"Did you…just…give me…an order?" His voice went up and down like a cracking rollercoaster. He was being drowned in anger.

"W-What? No it wasn't like that I just…" She didn't know what to say to him. Hiro pointed the tube of the extinguisher at Maka. Everyone around her gasped and ran away from her, leaving her to stand by herself. "Ah!" She screamed and covered herself as Hiro pressed the lever to spray white foam on her.

However, it didn't work and no foam came out like he had planned. "Damnit!" He shouted in frustration and lifted the extinguisher above his head.

"Oh my god he's gonna throw it!" Students gasped. "Don't do it Hiro!"

"Hiro cut it out!" Maka heard Soul shout and she looked over to see him running towards her. _Where did he come from?_ She thought. _Wasn't he with Kim? _And sure enough Kim was running right behind him, trying to get to Maka. A loud squeal and a scream from Hiro brought her attention back to him and she saw the metal cylinder leave his hands and fly through the air straight towards her. She moved her arms to cover herself.

Suddenly, someone moved in front of her. She opened her eyes to see a person's back, and their arms by their side ready to guard her. _Soul? _She thought. The extinguisher was getting closer as he protected her.

_Soul!_

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She saw from the side the extinguisher was about to reach Soul's face and she jumped forward and tackled Soul, pushing him out of the way. When she turned around she saw the fire extinguisher had hit the wall and bounced off it, hitting Kim in the shoulder and she fell to the ground.

"Oh my god Kim!" Students started crowding around her.

"Are you okay?"

"That looked like it hurt!"

"Someone get a teacher!"

Maka's eyes widened.

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"Ow…ow…"

"Don't cry now Kim, it's not that bad." Nurse Medusa told her.

"What if it leaves a scar?" Kim sniffled as the nurse put ice on her shoulder.

Maka was sitting in a chair across from the bed that Kim was sitting on. "If it does, I'll deal with it somehow." She said in a determined voice.

She sniffled. "How do you plan to do that?" The nurse removed her hand from the ice pack and Kim moved her arm to hold it herself.

"I'll just handle it okay?" Maka said through gritted teeth. She got up from her chair and turned around, leaving Kim and Nurse Medusa in the infirmary. She walked over to the door and lifted her hand up but before she could open it, it slid open.

It was Soul.

She stood face to face with him and he looked at her for a split second, before pushing past her and walking behind her to get to Kim.

"No boys back here, please." The nurse nagged him.

He ignored her. "Does it hurt?" He asked Kim.

She sniffled again. "Y-Yeah."

"Let me see."

"No…" She protested weakly.

He chuckled. "Come on." Kim lifted the ice pack off her shoulder.

"…thanks." She muttered softly.

Maka bit her lip and after hearing their conversation she stomped out of the infirmary and slammed the door shut.

_**~TWO DAYS LATER~**_

It's Sunday and the three of them were back on the basketball court. It's been two days since the Hiro incident, and he now has a court session because he hurt Kim.

"I'm sorry seriously!" Soul laughed and passed the basketball to Kid.

"But why did you?" Maka shouted, catching the ball Kid passed to her.

"I said I'm sorry!" He started to crack up and passed the ball to Kid.

"Ugh give me a break!" Kid passed it on to Maka. "I mean who takes a girl to a basketball game on their first date?"

"Yeah I thought you said the _three of us_ were going. Ugh!" She said as she aimed the basketball at Soul's head, hoping to do some brain damage, grunting because of how much power she put into the pass. "I was looking forward to it!"

"I'm sorry!" He caught the ball, pushing back a little at the force, and then dribbled it around him. "Kim said a basketball game would work for her."

"So you gonna date her or what?" Kid teased.

"Ha! You know it!" Soul's grin was gleaming as he passed the ball to Maka.

"Huh?" The basketball hit her in the stomach, causing her to make an 'oof' noise. She fell over for a bit with the ball in her hand, holding her stomach and letting the pain simmer for a bit before she felt fine enough to stand back up and dribble the ball.

"You alright?" Kid asked her.

She ignored Kid's concern. "Are you serious?" She asked Soul, still dribbling and holding the ball hostage and wouldn't pass it unless he answered her.

"Yeah, something wrong with that?" Soul said casually. When Maka stayed silent, he continued on, trying to convince her it wasn't that bad. "Well what can I say, she gets me."

Maka frowned. "Well how _nice_ for you!" She screamed and passed the ball as far away from Soul as she could.

"_Ugh! Geez you idiot! How about aiming first!" _Soul nagged her, his voice distant since he ran a little further away to retrieve the ball.

She sighed and slumped her shoulders.

_**~THE NEXT DAY~**_

Tsubaki was sick and didn't show up for school that day, and Kim was busy during lunch again, but Maka knew that she was spending it with Soul even if Kim never told her or Tsubaki about it. And even though her other friends invited her to have lunch with them, aware the other two weren't with her, she turned down their offer and decided to walk around the school campus alone. She felt like she had a lot on her mind, and it was the perfect time to think about things, but for some reason she couldn't bring herself to ponder over her thoughts.

She walked past the tree the three of them used to sit under, and the soccer field across from the tree. She thought about how her time traveling was changing things, changing her friendship with Soul and the bond between her, Kim, and Tsubaki and how now, the three of them weren't eating lunch together. But then, she turned a corner and saw through one of the classroom windows Soul and Kim eating together and laughing again. She wondered why they weren't under that one tree she saw them under a few days ago.

However, seeing the two of them together didn't settle well with her again and she quickly walked away before she could start getting emotional about it.

At the end of the school day, Maka went to her bike and unlocked it. As she was getting on she noticed the three girls she saw earlier; Liz, Patty, and Jacqueline. She followed their gaze to Kid, who was getting his skateboard. She saw them talking to each other while keeping their eyes glued onto him. Gradually, she saw their eyes move towards her until they finally fell on her. _Why are they looking at me?_ She thought, and quickly turned her head away to focus on her bike before they noticed she was looking at them, when suddenly she felt an arm fall over her shoulders.

"Hey Maka! Come on let's go!" Kid said with an ear to ear grin on his face.

"H-Hold on a second!" Maka laughed with him. "Let me just get my bike out."

After she freed her bike from containment, Kid got on his skateboard and rode away while Maka hopped onto her bike and followed him to the basketball courts.

Once they were gone, Patty whispered to Liz. "Dang, she's putting us to shame."

"I'll be straight up Liz, I don't know if you have a chance with Kid at this rate." Jacqueline told her. "It looks like they're already going out."

"Well since Soul's been busy now it's just the two of them most of the time." Liz sighed in defeat. "I guess it's inevitable." She slumped her shoulders.

Leaning their upper bodies and moving their heads behind her back so she couldn't hear them, Patty and Jacqueline whispered to each other. "We've got to do something about this." Patty said.

Jacqueline nodded. "Yeah, I can't stand seeing Liz like this."

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"Sucks not having Soul here. Guy doesn't really hang around us anymore." He dribbled the basketball. Since Maka wasn't in the mood to play he decided to just shoot some baskets himself. He jumped and shot the ball. "Let's try and get him here tomorrow."

Maka sat on a nearby bench, feet on the bench and as she rested her chin on her knees. "But that wouldn't be fair to Kim." She told him.

"How about I say you miss him?" Kid laughed and picked the ball up to shoot it again. "I bet he'd come then."

"Who said I miss him?" She shouted immediately, a little more loudly than she wanted.

Kid laughed at her reaction and decided to think that her reaction meant she really did miss him. "Oh please, he settled for Diehl only because _you_ turned him down." He dribbled the ball and did some tricks.

"What? I did not!" She defended again. _Does he know about when he asked me? _She worried for a bit, then shook her head. _No, that's impossible._

"Well sure you did, he obviously had a thing for you and you pretended not to notice." He chuckled about it. When he looked over at Maka to see her expression, his smile went away. She looked speechless, stunned, and completely out of it. "Oh geez Maka, don't tell me you didn't know." He smiled uneasily and his short chuckle was broken. Now his tone was completely serious. "_Seriously?_ I thought it was pretty obvious."

"S-Stop messing around!" She quickly scolded him, fuming."And anyways, why don't _you_ find a girl?"

Kid stopped dribbling the ball and put it under his arm, then turned to Maka with a smirk on his face. "Because if I _did_ start going out with someone, then I wouldn't be able to hang out with you as much." He then teased her. "You'd end up _alone_."

Maka looked at his face, and he just looked back at her with the grin. To her his expression was charming and sophisticated, unlike the childish, reckless, careless Soul. She had never seen Kid smile at her this way, in fact she had _never_ seen Kid smile _at_ her, it was always smiling because he was always having so much fun and enjoying the moments. His smile was reaching out to her in a way it never had, and it wasn't the kind of smile a friend gave to another friend.

She became worried.

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"But I thought you had a thing for Kid. He's the one who always helps when you're having problems right?" Wes commented.

"Kid's there for everyone." Maka commented, sitting on the couch again and fiddling with her thumbs.

Maka was back in Wes' office, the place she always went to when she had issues. He was like a therapist to her, and it really bugged her that she has been seeing him for advice and counseling so often lately. Her life must really be in turmoil for her visits to increase exponentially, but nonetheless he was the only person she could truly turn to and so she had no other choice.

"Well why don't you go out with him?" Wes suggested casually, writing in his notepad _again_.

A frown immediately appeared on her face and her tone raised a little. "Why would you even suggest that." It didn't come out as a question, more of a comment to show how misunderstood she felt, and after everything she told him about not wanting to ruin the way things were between the three of them.

He kept his eyes glued to his work. "It's like I said you could always go back to being friends, back to how it was."

"It's not as possible as you make it sound." She leaned back in the couch, crossed her legs, crossed her arms, and turned her head to the side silently fuming. "Besides, I would never do that."

"And why is that?" He stopped writing and put his hand in his chin, giving Maka his full attention so he could listen to her answer.

"Because…" She thought about how to word it for a while before responding. "Because…if my feelings aren't a hundred and one percent I shouldn't even consider us being more than friends." She determined. "It'd be like toying with someone's feelings."

"And that's something new to you?"

She shot him a look. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Avoiding her suddenly sharpened glare, he looked back down onto his notepad and tapped his fingers on it, trying to get some sort of rhythm or melody. "Not much, just from what you've told me it seems that since you've been going back into the past you've been playing all sorts of mind games on peop-"

"Oh yeah like what?" She interrupted, demanding an explanation.

He continued to explain it to her with a cool expression and casual tone, as if he were reading a book. "Well, there's that Soul kid you mentioned to me once, and how you stopped him from confessing his feelings to you. And that Kim girl, who liked him and now you've used your power to bring them together, like it's a game to you."

"You're the one who said I should use it for more significant things!" She huffed. "Besides I'm helping the two of them, Soul even told me himself that he liked Kim."

"Did he?"

She blinked at his sudden tone. His words were strict and sharp as he confronted her. "Well…" She thought about it and uncrossed her arms, letting them fall. "Not exactly. He told me was that she understood him, and he looked kind of happy when he said it so I just assumed..."

"Are you sure you didn't do it out of selfishness?" He paused when she stayed silent, begging for an explanation. "You felt uncomfortable right, the thought of you and Soul being more than friends, so to make yourself feel better you decided to make sure he liked someone else, and that way you wouldn't feel uncomfortable anymore."

"Why would you even say something like that?" Maka shouted.

He ignored her outburst and continued to focus on his work. "But now there's Kid, and now the two of you are hanging out all the time since Soul's gone with Kim you two are practically going out already you just need the title boyfriend and girlfriend."

She stood up and messed with her hair. "What's wrong with you Wes? I thought you were supposed to be helping me with this but you're just making it worse telling me all the bad things about my life!"

"Well before you time leaped, there were never any bad things in your life for me to tell you about, right?"

She stopped releasing her anger, and shot him a deer in headlights look. She saw that he was looking at her again with his honest eyes, the kind of look that seemed familiar to her, because it was. Wes was giving her the same look Soul gives her when he's trying to get her attention to her head so she can think things through, if that makes sense because frankly it still didn't make sense to her.

He went back to his notepad and started scribbling in it. "Maybe it's time you started thinking about the cons instead of the pros of this."

Maka sat back down in the couch rather heavily, laid on one side, and shoved her face into a pillow. _"This is so frustrating!"_ Her voice muffled from the pillow. _"Maybe if you played me your song I'd feel better." _She complained.

Wes smirked. "Sorry."

_**~THE NEXT DAY~**_

It was lunch time, and Maka was walking around the school by herself. It was starting to become a sort of daily thing, much to her dismay, but she figured that if everyone else was happy then she was happy too. Tsubaki had decided to spend lunch with Black Star since they didn't see each other much anymore, and Maka didn't want to ruin their relationship so she didn't have any other choice. She began thinking again, finding nothing better to do. So she thought about how all her friends were spending their days happily, but at her own expense. She felt like she was giving too much, but then Wes' words pulled her back into her believing it was the only way to make her feel at ease she wasn't hurting anyone.

But as her thoughts grew deeper, she realized that she was wrong. She _was_ hurting her friends. Kim had gotten hit by the extinguisher, although that probably had nothing to do with her, and she was currently dating Soul who might or might not like her because according to Kid it was obvious he had some sort of thing for Maka. Then she thought of the look Kid gave her, and that if he really did start liking her and she couldn't return his feelings, she'd be hurting him as well.

Not to mention Liz who undoubtedly had a crush on him, and her two friends giving as much effort as they could to hooking the two of them up. If Kid ended up liking Maka, then she would be hurting Liz as well.

"Is everything really that bad?" She asked herself, walking down a stairwell.

She heard voices but she couldn't see their sources when soon she was shoved against a wall, with two hands on each of her shoulders. She closed her eyes at the surprise corner attack in the stairwell. When she opened her eyes, she thought _speak of the devil._ Jacqueline and Patty each had one hand on one of Maka's shoulders and were looking at her.

"Hey, we gotta ask you something." Jacqueline said. To Maka's surprise, it was a sweet and honest tone, and not like the physical attack she experience a few seconds ago.

"Yeah?" Maka replied. "What's up?"

"Y-You guys!" Maka looked straight ahead and saw Liz standing in the middle of them and in front of her, blushing red at the embarrassment.

Sighing, the two of them took their hands off her. "Sorry about the roughness." Patty smiled. "We just wanted to make sure we got to you before we missed our chance and you left."

"Oh, well then, what is it?" Maka asked them casually.

"I-It's nothing! Just ignore them!" Liz pleaded.

"Are you going out with Kid?" Jacqueline boldly shouted.

"S-Say what?" Maka was caught off guard. She thought they were just going to ask for a favor.

"You're _always_ around him." Jacqueline continued. "So are you going steady with Kid?"

"H-Huh?" Maka was continuously speechless.

"P-Please guys this is embarrassing…" Liz tried to persuade them.

"Well?" Patty demanded, ignoring her. "Are you, or not?"

"Are you going out with him?" Jacqueline added.

_Really…unbelievable…_ Maka thought as a shaky smile came onto her face and she could feel that if she were in a manga, she would have sweat dropped.

…

"It was back in my first year of high school. I was the new student and I wasn't really good at making friends, but Kid always smiled and talked to me like I've known him since kindergarten. I always admired the way he was always so nice to everyone, and he was always there for everyone. I started to like him since the first time he smiled at me, because he was the first person to talk to me." She paused. "But I never did anything to further our friendship and we haven't been talking as often as we used to in the past few years. I still like him though, but I think he's moved on."

"So when we saw you two hanging around each other a lot, we thought he moved on to you." Jacqueline added, then smiled. "But I guess we were wrong."

"Glad to clear things up." Maka smiled and laughed. "But yeah that sounds like him. Kid's the kind of person who does that to people. I guess that's how he became friends with Soul when he first transferred." She patted Liz on the back. "Don't worry about it too much, he's so dense he probably doesn't even realize what he's doing. If it helps, I really liked your story. Really, you should go for him."

"Well the problem is Liz was so put down thinking that he forgot about her then finally, _finally_, we got her to ask him." Patty said.

"You mean that day on the basketball court?" Maka asked her.

"Wait, how'd you know that?" Jacqueline questioned.

Maka forgot that she was hiding behind the bush. "O-Oh, Kid told me. You know, gossiping…" She laughed uneasily. She didn't want them to think anything bad of her. She quickly changed the subject. "So then what happened?"

"Well, according to Kid…" Jacqueline began.

"'_I'm sorry but I can't go out with you!'"_ Patty quoted in a deeper voice, trying to sound like Kid.

"'_I've already given my love to someone!'"_ Jacqueline added, also trying to imitate him.

"N-No, wait! I-!" Maka stuttered.

Jacqueline looked over at her. "That's not really how it went."

She stared at the two girls in disbelief, while Liz was just quietly watching them talk. Maka was about to say something but then they interrupted her again with another impersonation.

"'_Before you say anything, you wouldn't happen to know where Maka is?'" _Patty continued.

"'_She didn't show, I hope she's okay.'" _Jacqueline added. "Then she finally asked him and…"

"…he turned me down." Liz finished, and the other three girls looked at her.

_Oh my gosh is it my fault? _Maka panicked in her head. _Was he so worried about me that he couldn't even think about saying yes?_

"He said he wasn't going out with you, but we weren't so convinced." Jacqueline stated, putting her hands on her hips.

"So are you _sure_ there's nothing going on between you guys?" Patty pressed.

"Yeah, he seemed _really_ concerned about you."

Before they could suffocate her with questions she moved away from them and waved her hands around, telling them to cut it out.

"No we're _not_ dating!" She told them. The three of them raised an eyebrow at her and she cleared her throat and fixed her posture. She put on a serious face and lowered her tone, trying to be like some sort of hero. "I'll deal with this somehow." She said in a pledging and vowing tone.

"Deal with it?" Jacqueline and Patty questioned in unison.

"What do you mean somehow?" Liz asked.

Maka put one hand in front of her chest and clenched it into a fist. She smiled a determined grin. "Just leave it to me." She ran away.

"What's she talking about?" The three girls asked themselves.

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"Carpe diem Liz! It's _now_ or never!"

"_Today's_ the day! Now go you might not get a chance like this again!"

Maka opened her eyes and found herself behind a tree. She saw Liz and the other two hiding behind the bush and looked over to see Kid and Soul on the basketball court, playing against each other. _Good, perfect landing! _She congratulated herself. She looked back over and saw Liz walk out of the bushes and towards Kid. He caught the basketball and put it under his arm when he noticed her walking towards him. She turned her head to see the other two holding each other behind the bush, praying or something. _Geez, talk about déjà vu. _She commented.

She saw Liz begin to speak and then Kid started to talk. _Now! _She told herself and appeared from behind the tree.

"Maka, there you are!" Kid looked behind and over Liz's shoulder to see Maka.

_Geez Kid, stop paying attention to me... _She mentally tried to tell walked over to Liz and put her hand on her shoulder so Kid would look back over at her. "Liz over here was just about to tell you that she's been in love with you since you first started talking to her…"

"W-Wait-!" Liz tried to stop Maka, but she was too quiet.

"…and she admires your way of befriending people and how nice you are. I'm impressed Kid, so anyways-"

"H-How do you know all that stuff about me!" Liz asked her, a little creeped out.

"Oh who me? Well, I…" Maka started scratching the back of her head. She didn't know how she was supposed to respond, she couldn't exactly tell Liz that she told her but that she traveled back in time so…nevermind.

"Stalker!" Patty accused. She grabbed her two friends and started inching away from Maka.

"Wait I'm not!" She pleaded.

Kid dribbled the basketball he had held under his arm. "Let me know when you guys are done talking." He passed the ball to Soul, who was just witnessing the entire conversation, and they continued their one on one game with each other.

"Wait! Kid!" She reached her arm out to him but he had already run towards Soul. Disappointed she dropped her arm and pouted. This had definitely _not_ gone as planned. More determined than ever she puffed up her chest and clenched both her hands into fists. "Okay, one more time!"

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Maka ended up behind the tree again, only this time Liz had already walked over to Kid and the two of them were talking on the court. She turned her head and sure enough the other two were praying with each other behind the bush. She revealed herself from behind the tree.

"Kid!" She shouted.

"Maka, there you are!" He was going to walk past Liz, pushing her aside, but Maka beat him by running right up to him. "W-Woah Maka what are you-"

She pointed a finger at him. "You are _unbelievable_!" She told him. "Just because I decided not to come to the court today doesn't mean you should worry about me!"

"What are you talking about?" Kid asked her defensively. "Who said I was worryi-"

She barely even heard him when she interrupted. "I mean you're being ridiculous to care about worrying about me so much you can't even take a second to care about what Liz here wants to say?" Maka was practically scolding him. She was kind of mad that he let such a stupid thing make him turn Liz down and she believed it was absolutely absurd. "Me being gone has nothing to do with it!"

"Sheesh what's your problem just showing up randomly and suddenly nagging me! And _what_ has nothing to do with _what_?" He yelled back.

She sighed. "I'm saying that the fact I decided to skip out on playing basketball just once and that Liz is practically _in love _with you have nothing to do with each other!"

Shades of pink found its way onto Liz's face. "I-It's not true!" She stuttered, turning around and running back into the bush where her two friends appeared from behind it. They each took one of her arms and walked her away from the basketball court, consoling her and shushing her.

"Wait Liz!" Maka tried to call her back.

"Well, you heard what the girl said. See you later." Kid turned his back to Maka and passed the ball to Soul.

"Kid, don't go!" She reached her arm out again, and dropped it…again.

"Ugh you've got to be kidding me!" She ruffled her hair, messing it up. "I've gotta be simpler about this!"

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She felt a breeze on her face. Her hands were clutching something shaped like a cylinder, and her feet and legs were moving in circles. She opened her eyes to realize she was biking.

She could see the school within her vision as she neared it. She looked around and noticed all her other classmates finally used to wearing their summer uniforms, but also noticing the changes they all made to suit the hot weather.

"Crap, I went too far back." She groaned.

A boy rode his bike right up to hers, slightly bumping her and she quickly moved to regain control of the handlebars, too busy in her thoughts to notice that he was coming. She looked over at the boy with a frown on her face as the two of them turned the corner together to go inside the gate of their school.

"Late again Maka?" He held back a chuckle, but couldn't hold back his smile.

"Oh, hey Soul." She responded in a monotone.

He raised an eyebrow. "What, no comeback?" He questioned.

She smiled at him so he wouldn't worry. "Sorry, I'm just kind of exhausted." _Yeah, I haven't slept in forever. _She thought. The time leaping threw of her count of how many hours she'd been up without sleep.

"It's morning, school hasn't even started." He laughed at her. "You're crazy you know that?"

"You have _no_ idea."

She pulled her brakes. The bike stopped slightly, but the lever was loosened.

…

"You two are here rather early." Kid smiled and looked at his watch while his two friends entered the classroom and walked over to him, sitting in his desk. "Wow look at that, you even have twenty seconds to spare." He laughed. "Maybe you guys should start coming earlier."

"Don't be such a perfectionist Kid." Soul sat down in his seat and laughed.

"Maybe _you_ should be late for a change." Maka commented, laughing as well.

She thought about how Soul hadn't joked about an alarm clock, and remembered that she changed the conversation when the two of them entered the school. She was smart about this, spending all her school time trying to figure out a plan that would work to get Kid and Liz together while acting as if none of her time leaping had happened. It was the first day that she time leaped, when Kim asked her to take the books to the lab, and when she found that strange item there. She had to think about it first, about how everything up until her last time leap never happened, and everything was back to normal. In fact, she wasn't even supposed to have time leaping powers yet but for some reason, she still had them.

In the middle of class she lifted up her arm to check on the number that was on her arm.

10?

Or 01?

She shook her curiosity out of her mind in time for the lunch bell to ring. "Okay, plan time!" She told herself.

Maka walked down to the courtyard of the school with Kim and Tsubaki to eat lunch under their usual tree. She looked onto the field and saw Kid, Soul, and Black Star playing soccer with each other. Before the three of them began to eat lunch she excused herself away from the other two, telling them she had to use the bathroom real quick, and walked away. She walked around with her hands behind her back and turned her head left and right.

She spotted two blonde girls and a brunette girl sitting with each other underneath another tree that was closer to the soccer field. She turned her body and walked over to them. The three girls looked over at Maka as she got closer. She silently reached them and with a sweet smile on her face, she grabbed one of Liz's arms with both her hands, stood her up, and started dragging her away.

"Hey! What do you think you're doing!" Jackie and Patty yelled, but made no effort to go after them.

"Sorry I need to borrow your friend here for a bit!" Maka shouted back at them, still holding onto Liz's arm.

"What?" Liz exclaimed, mind boggling in confusion.

Jackie and Patty blinked once, then looked at each other with gaping faces. "'Borrow?'" They said in unison.

"Um, Maka. Where are you taking me?" Liz asked, trying to keep up with her pace.

"Uh…you'll find out." She smiled at her.

"O-Okay…" Liz just followed obediently. Maka stopped walking and yanked Liz's arm, throwing Liz in front of her and then pushing her forward, a little farther away from Maka. Liz stumbled. "Hey what're you-!"

"_Look out!" _She was interrupted and turned her head in the direction of the voice to see a flying soccer ball headed straight towards her. She gasped and trembled a little, but still managed to cover her arms over her head to protect herself from the pain she was probably about to receive. Instead she was greeted by what seemed to be another person's body and when she came to, she realized she was lying on her back on the floor and someone was on top of her.

"Oh! Sorry." Kid got off of her and scrambled to get up without hurting her. "I caught the ball before it could hit you but I guess I tripped and fell over." He chuckled embarrassingly.

"Ow my butt…" Liz sat up and rubbed her butt.

He put his hand out in front of her. "Here let me help you up."

"No, it's okay." Liz used her arms to help push herself up. She stood up for a second but when she tried to walk she collapsed over one leg and fell back to her knees, holding and rubbing her ankle.

"Ouch looks like a sprained ankle." He commented. He bent down to his knees and grabbed her hand.

Liz immediately blushed. "K-Kid! What are you doing?"

He ignored her comment. Kid moved his arm over his head, guiding the hand he held over his shoulder farthest away from her. "Hold on to me." He wrapped one arm around her waist and she leaned against his other shoulder as he stood up, pulling her up with him and letting her lean on him when he led her to the nurse.

"T-Thanks." She told him, limping and trying to hide her face.

The crowd around them dispersed as the two of them disappeared into the school. Maka, watching from the sidelines, smiled proudly and satisfied. She stretched her arms over her hands and then placed them on her hips. "Now everything's perfect. And it's all thanks to yours truly!" She walked back over to Kim and Tsubaki.

…

The rest of the day went by as routinely as ever. Liz spent most of it after the incident at lunch on the bed in the dispensary. Kid stayed with her the whole time, giving Medusa the excuse of guilt that it was his fault for falling into her and hurting her ankle. After some inadequate protesting from Liz and some authoritative arguing with Medusa, he was given full pardon from classes to help her throughout the day.

Maka and Kim stayed after school to perform their cleanup duties. Tired of repeating the school day and repeating her school chores, she finished her jobs at a slug's pace. By the time she was done watering the plants, Kim had already finished writing on the board.

"Hey Maka, is it your turn to bring these notebooks to the science lab?" She asked her.

Said girl slowly turned her head with hung shoulders and droopy eyes, still holding the water can in her hand. Her mouth hung open like it'd been that way for a while, and a small drop of drool threatened to escape the corner of her mouth. "Huh…oh, yeah." She stopped pouring water on the plants and set it down on the table beside her.

Kim laughed at her facial expression and grabbed half of the pile. "I'll help you."

Maka walked over to her and grabbed the other half. "Thanks."

The two of them exited their classroom and walked together down the hall towards the lab. "I hope you value our friendship here." She joked.

Maka laughed back.

…

Outside in the bike parking lot, Kid helped Liz as they walked over to Maka's bike.

"Um, Kid. Where are we going?" Liz asked him as he helped her lean on the wall.

"Maka's dad knows a doctor named Stein, so I'm going to take you to him." He replied sincerely, and walked towards a bike. "I can't take you on my skateboard, so we'll have to borrow Maka's bike." He said casually.

"Is she okay with this?" She asked.

Kid took out his phone, pressed some buttons, then closed it. "There, I texted her." He gave an assuring smile to her then moved the dials to put in the code. "42564. Typical Maka." He told himself as he unlocked her bike, put up the kickstand, and walked it over to Liz. "Here, get on." He put his hand out to help her stand up.

Liz and Kid doubled on Maka's bike and rode out of school grounds.

…

"Thanks for helping me out Kim." Maka said gratefully. The two of them had just finished putting the books away.

She replied with a smile. "Don't mention it. It was-huh? Did you hear that?" Kim interrupted herself, and then looked over at the door.

_That's right, the noise! _Maka remembered and also turned her head towards the door. _So it wasn't my imagination! _She walked over to it. "I'll open it." She offered.

Kim nodded her head, and watched as Maka turned the doorknob and threw open the door. Maka looked left, then right, then braved herself enough to take a few steps inside. She carefully looked around as she walked around the room, checking every corner of the room and underneath the desks. _"Do you see anything?" _She heard Kim's voice, that sounded distant, trying to penetrate through the wall that separated them.

"No one's here!" Maka shouted back to Kim from the other room. Suddenly, her phone vibrated and she opened it. "It's from Kid."

'_Hey, I'm borrowing your bike to take Liz to Doctor Stein.  
>Hope you don't mind thanks!<em>

_PS: I'm thinking of asking her out. You jealous? ;)'_

She closed her phone and laughed at his comment. "Yeah, whatever. Who do you think set you guys up in the first place?" She closed her phone.

A realization hit her half a second after she stopped laughing and took her phone back out and opened it. Three words struck her like lightning as she looked closer at the screen.

'…_borrowing your bike…'_

"Oh no..." She gasped.

Maka quickly ran out of the room, almost hitting the door hinge on her way out. Kim heard her heavy and worried footsteps as she ran out of the other room. When her friend appeared she saw her running towards her, but her eyes were set on the exit door of the classroom. "Maka?" Kim commented as her friend ran past her at such speed the following breeze blew her hair and skirt in one direction. "Where are you going!" She shouted and ran to the door her friend just went through. She saw Maka running down the hallway at practically lightning speed, as she leaned against and clutched the door border to peek her head outside of the room.

Both of them were away from the front table to see the strange object roll onto the floor.

She ran out of the school, looking nowhere but straight forward so she made sure she didn't run into anybody or trip or fall or do anything that would delay her from reaching her destination. Maka fumbled to take out her cell phone and dialed Kid's number. "Come on pick up!" She prayed outloud.

It went straight to voicemail.

…

Kid was riding his bike with Liz doubling on it. He rode it with one hand, the phone in his other hand.

"Hey Stein. Yeah it's Kid. I got a sprained ankle for you. No it's not me. No it's not Maka or Soul either." He chuckled. "Okay, I'll be there soon."

"Thanks, again." Liz told him, with her arms wrapped around his back.

…

"Damnit Kid why aren't you picking up!" Maka screamed to her phone.

Maka ran as fast as she could, trying to catch up with the ringing of the bells and lights coming from the railroad crossing. She maneuvered around the crowd like never before. The train was coming closer and heads started to turn and look at her. Even a few feet away from the bars and she wasn't slowing down, and some stepped out of her way because they assumed she was committing suicide and would soon run onto the tracks and into the train. But that wasn't her intention at all, and she made a slight _umph!_ noise when her torso collided with the bar and her upper body was thrown over and she coughed slightly at the contact.

The train passed by her quickly, merely a few feet away from her head and the breeze blew her hair in all sorts of directions. She backed away far enough that the bars could raise up after the train disappeared, and people could start walking across the tracks again. As the walked by people continued to look at her, but she was too busy catching her breath to care.

A father and his daughter passed by close to her and Maka stopped them for a second. "U-Um, excuse me. You wouldn't happen to know if there was a bike accident, would you?" She asked as sweetly as she could.

"Uh, no I don't sorry." The father replied.

"Okay, thanks." Maka said softly, her tone sounding a little disappointed, and the two of them continued to walk away from her. _Did they not come by here yet? _She thought to herself. _Where are they? _She screamed in her head.

Suddenly, she heard a loud ringing noise and felt a vibration. She took her cell phone out of her skirt. "KID?" She thrust the phone to her ear with mighty speed and screamed immediately.

"_You didn't show up at the court today."_

She could have sworn she stopped breathing for a split second. Her eyes widened at first, but then she began to relax at the sound of his voice. _Soul…_Maka thought to herself. "Oh, sorry about that. Wait Soul! Do you know where Kid is?" She replied.

"_Kid? He skipped out too. I think he's at home. Why what's going on?" _She could hear him dribbling the ball from the other end of the line.

She sighed, relieved. "Just making sure." _Thank goodness they're okay, _she thanked the heavens.

He chuckled. _"Whatever, you idiot." _He blew off her behavior. _"Hey! I'm still waiting here you know!" _He said impatiently but in a joking tone.

"Well wait a little longer!" Maka laughed at him, louder than she had intended. She had to hold her stomach. "It's nice talking to you, feels like it's been forever."

"_What are you talking about, we've been talking all day."_

"Oh right." She paused. "Um, Soul?" Her suddenly serious tone caught him off guard, and he stopped snickering on the other side of the phone.

"_Whatsup?"_

Maka began walking up the hill again, making her way through the crowd as she furthered away from the tracks. "What do you think of Kid going out with that girl?"

He chuckled a little. _"What's this all of a sudden?"_

Her voice lowered, almost to a sad tone but she tried her best to hide it. "It's just that, do you think things will be different between the three of us?"

"_He's gonna have to make some commitments to her but other than that no. Why is anything wrong?"_

"N-No not at all! I just wanted to hear your opinion on the topic." Her voice became louder suddenly in her defensive tone.

"_Well, alright then."_

"Hey! Don't sound so uninterested in Kid's love life I mean I'm happy that he finally got-"

"_Maka."_

That caught her off guard. "Yeah?"

"_Since we're talking, there's something I've been meaning to ask you for a while now."_

"What is it?" Maka stopped walking. She was pretty far from the tracks now, but not quite at the top of the hill. Her heart skipped a beat and she was thinking he was going to ask her out again just like before and this time, she'll most likely have an answer to it.

"_Have you been…"_

The world seemed to freeze around her, and all noise from the streets were now null and void in her ears. She held her breath, waiting for him to say it.

"…_time leaping?"_

She gasped, but kept silent and didn't respond. That was _not_ what she expected to hear. AT ALL. The silence in her ears continued, although the people continued to rush past her. She had a numerous amount of mixed feelings now, but the biggest one would probably be fear. She was scared of what was going to happen, she was scared he would find out the truth, and she was scared that he might not have those feelings for her she assumed he did, because she was kind of looking forward to them.

"_You've been time leaping, haven't you."_

Her eyes widened.

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"_He's gonna have to make some commitments to her but other than that no. Why is anything wrong?"_

"No, I was just curious." Her plan was to curve the conversation. That's a good start.

"_Well, alright then." _There was a moment of pause, since Maka didn't know what to talk about now, and changing the subject too quickly would seem suspicious, but she waited too long. _"Maka, since we're talking, there's something I've been meaning to ask you for a while now."_

"I don't really think now's a great time for questions!" She tried to avoid the conversation. "Let's talk about my papa and how stupid he is!" She laughed uneasily, and continued walking up the hill.

"_H-Hey I was talking to you here."_

She raised her voice a little, hoping to overpower his. "Have I ever told you he always takes my candy bars?"

"_Look I'm trying to ask-"_

"Or that sometimes he gives it to Stein?" She desperately interrupted him.

"_Listen, I…" _She heard him sigh and give up. _"Nevermind. Later Maka." _He hung up.

Maka closed her phone and looked up. "How does Soul know about time leaping?" She asked herself as quietly as she could, stopping on that same far away spot on the hill when he asked her the question. Her eyes widened and she gasped at a realization and grabbed her arm to check it. "Aw man, I was right. That really _was_ the number of leaps I had left." She frowned and sighed in personal defeat. "And I used my last one on something so stupid." She pepped herself up and even forced herself to smile.. "Well, as long as Kid and Liz are okay."

"MAKA!" She looked up to see who was saying her name.

Kid passed her.

On her bike.

With Liz hanging onto his back.

Maka dropped her phone as soon as he passed him and as it violently met the ground she turned around and started running back downhill to try and stop him. "KID! STOP!"

"What?" He yelled back. He was riding down the steep hill at an alarming speed. It was so fast that in that short amount of time he had already gotten too far to hear her clearly.

"Stop!" Tears began welling up in her eyes as she ran as fast as she could, getting windburn in her face as well. She bumped into the old woman and her son again.

"Hey watch where you're going!" She shouted with her fist in the air, turning red as a tomato from anger.

"Mama look! The bars are coming down!" The son told his mother, getting excited by the lights and bells of the railroad crossing like it was some sort of light show or something.

Maka didn't have time to turn around and apologize, but she _did_ hear the boy shout like he had before, pointing at the bars. She was already running for them, so she saw the long wooden sticks go from vertical to horizontal. Unfortunately, her friends were in front of her.

"Shit! Kid STOP!" She reached an arm out to him, hoping it would somehow make her go faster or reach him faster.

He was far away, and all she could see was him turning his head around and screaming back at Maka with a terrified look on his face, then looked down at Liz who was holding onto him for dear life. However her vision was quickly blocked when a shoe hit her in the face. The contact made her trip and lose her balance, and she started falling and rolling down the hill in the middle of the street, tracking dirt and blood on herself. She stopped rolling headfirst and landed on her stomach. She felt her body covered in rocks, scratches, bruises, and her face must have looked absolutely horrid.

She put the palm of one of her hand onto the cement and lifted herself up, using the forearm of her other arm as some sort of support to keep her upper body staying up. She looked over at the shoe that had flown at her seemingly out of nowhere…

…it was Kid's.

Tears started pouring out of her eyes and her sight on Kid started to become fuzzy as many pedestrians started crowding around her, bending down, asking if she was okay, and trying to aid her. She kept moving her head around to see past them and try to get a glimpse of the two of them on her bike.

She heard it when the front of the tire collided with the bar. The pedestrians turned their bodies away from Maka to look at what was going on at the train tracks, as they heard the screams coming from there. Kid and Liz were thrown into the air, in the same exact way Maka had been thrown into the air. The train was barely a few feet away from them as they flew throughout the air. Then she heard it, the sound of the train's horn coming nearer and nearer to touching the two of them.

She began screaming and praying that some miracle would happen. She begged with herself, begged with some sort of God that might be watching them at that moment, pleading that he or she would somehow return to her one last time leap so she could go back just a few minutes earlier…to stop this.

"Stop."

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"Stop."

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"Stop!"

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"STOP!"

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"_STOP!"_

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.

She knew something was different. The noises of the streets, the people, and of course, the train, had all disappeared. Her eyes were dry and no longer had tears running down them. Her body, didn't hurt anymore, and her face felt clean. She opened her eyes.

Time was frozen.

She looked around frantically. Turning her body left, then right, and then doing a full circle to gather in her surroundings. Everyone…every single person… was completely frozen like statues in whatever it was they were doing. _Did I do this? Did it work? _Maka was up against the bar that stood between her and the train tracks, and the father and his daughterwere standing next to her again. "But I thought I ran out of time leaps?" She muttered to herself, completely confused and distraught. _This was before Kid and Liz passed me on the bike, before I got the phone call, _she continued to think. "What's going on?" She kept thinking how it happened, or why it happened.

"I knew it was you."

She turned around completely. Her eyes widened and she gasped, tears almost appearing again.

"Soul?" She screamed.

He was standing in front of her, with a neutral yet uneasy expression on his face. He was holding a bike, with each of his hands on each handlebar. _That's…my bike, _she thought, and her body started to tremble. _What's going on? _Her mind became frantic. _I thought Kid had it, what's he doing with it? _She felt as if nothing was real anymore, nothing made sense anymore. She was expecting him to say something in response to her reaction, but they continued to look at each other in silence, trying to soak in the situation.

He pulled the brake lever on one of the handles, and it loosely wiggled back and forth. She stopped breathing. "Are…are _you_ doing this? Soul?" He looked away. "You can time leap too?" She screamed in surprise, and at her last remark he looked back over at her and gave her a look that pleaded with her.

"Would you laugh if I told you I came from… the future."

She used up all her strength to hold back the tears that threatened to escape her eyes with the sudden revelation. That's it, she decided nothing was real anymore. The fact that one of her best friends throughout the entire year, the boy who confessed his love to her, although that fact remains unbeknownst to that boy, could be from a completely different era, the _future_, completely shocked her mind into a state of oblivion.

Then again, she thought the same way about time leaping and that turned out to be a legitimate thing. However she was filled with mixed emotions, and she was in disbelief. But the proof of him being from the future was too obvious to ignore. She realized she had no time leaps left, so her stopping this and going back to before the train accident was absolutely impossible, whereas Soul was the only other person who could move in the frozen atmosphere. She figured since he was from the future, he probably had a better control of this whole time leaping thing so he could make it so another person other than him could move.

A glass spilling water had stopped and half the water was already outside of the glass. The birds looked like they were painted into the sky. The people's expressions seemed as though they were painted on their face. The falling leaves stopped halfway in their descent. The traffic lights stopped changing colors. The kids playing soccer on a nearby field were frozen like statues on one foot in the middle of a kick, or completely off the ground in the middle of a dive. The two of them continued to look at each other, as he let her take in what he just said. Seeing how speechless she had become, he decided to continue speaking so she didn't have to respond.

"Where I'm from, they developed these devices that allow people to travel through time whenever they want." He showed Maka the object she had found in the science lab the first day she time leaped. "This is mine. Somewhere along the way, I lost it." He paused. "I found it again in the science lab. But by the time I got there…" He crushed it in the palm of his hand. "…it had already been used up."

The two of them walked together. Well, not really together. It was mostly her following a few feet behind him, drowning in curiosity and anxious to hear what he was about to say.

"I would stay up all night, I couldn't sleep thinking that it might fall into the wrong hands." He sighed and smirked ever so slightly. "I'm relieved to know it was being used by an idiot."

She pouted a little at his comment. "So, why did you come back here?" She restrained a comeback.

He led her in front of a large building with ornate designs. The conversation became serious again. "When you asked me if I was related to your dad's friend Wes, I lied. I _am_ from the Evans family, the family of musicians." He revealed. "I changed my last name when I came back to this era so no one would find out, especially none of the living Evans now." He sighed and walked up to the door of the concert hall. "This is where my family used to perform, but I guess now, in this time, it's _where_ they perform."

He put his hand lightly on the door. "I wanted to hear a piece of music that one of my ancestors wrote called 'Meditation of Souls', because I was named after it. But by my time, all traces of it had been destroyed. The only record of it that I managed to find, led me here, to this time. It was here, in _this_ era, in _this_ place." His face became solemn. "I wanted to hear it, no matter how far I had to go, no matter how long it took, and no matter how dangerous it was. I just needed to listen to it once and that would've been enough for me to remember it for the rest of my life." His fingers slid down the doors of the concert hall. "But it doesn't matter now. Nothing does." He said in a low apathetic tone and walked away with his hands in his pocket.

The two walked away and continued to talk in the frozen space. Once again, he was leading and she ended up following a few paces behind.

"So what'll you do now?" She asked him.

"There isn't much left for me, I can't go back." He responded, keeping his solemn voice.

"What do you mean you can't go back?" Her tone started to become more like she was pleading instead of asking questions. Desperate-like for answers.

"It's just what I said, I can't return to my own time." It was surprising how calm his voice sounded, how it was as casual as he could get with that morose attitude he now sported.

"I know but why?" She dragged on her words in a wailing tone. She stopped walking, refusing to move until he answered.

He followed in her suit, stopped and turned around. He walked a few feet closer to her while putting his arm out in front of her and grabbing the band of his watch. "Because having to go back and steal your bike that Kid was supposed to ride, used up my last time leap." He pulled the band back to reveal a '00' symbol on his wrist.

Her eyes widened, and the tears started coming again but she desisted from crying. She had mixed emotions fill her again, how her friend was not only from the future, but he could time leap, and now, it turns out he had just used his last one. She raised her voice to a higher volume and shouted at him.

"Why would you waste it on something like that? Why not save it for something importa-!"

"I _did_ save it for something important." He interrupted. "You probably haven't realized this Maka, but Kid and that girl _did_ _die_ at that train crossing. And a certain someone was sobbing, depressed and blaming herself for it." He sighed. "I didn't have a choice."

Tears continued to well up in her eyes. "B-But now…you…" They slid down her cheek.

Soul kept his hands in his pockets. With intense emotions he began to unravel everything. The atmosphere between them was thick, as the situation sunk in. He stepped away from where the two of them were and looked up at the sky, and took a breath in of the frozen air.

"I was supposed to go back, but before I knew it, summer came. I guess being with you and Kid was so much fun, time just sort of flew by." He spoke softly, reminiscing as if he was talking to himself.

Maka followed behind him, unable to catch up to his speed of walking. He didn't realize he was walking so fast, or that the whole time his back was facing her, and she tried to get a glimpse of his face to see if she could read his emotions.

"Well what about your time?" She asked, trying to get his attention. "It must be a lot more fun right?"

He took a short pause before responding. "I like it here." He ignored her and continued ahead, with her struggling to keep with his pace. "I saw water running through the land, for the first time. I saw just how big and clear the sky was and how green the world could be, for the first time. I rode a bike, for the first time. And mostly…"

_What kind of world is the future anyways? _She panicked a little in her head as he finished his sentence.

"…I'd never seen so many people in one place before." He commented finally, as the two of them arrived at a busy shopping district, where hundreds of citizens were crossing the streets, frozen of course.

By the time Maka had caught up with him, Soul had disappeared somewhere in the crowd. She was paying attention to his words, but at the same time she couldn't really understand where he was coming from. She maneuvered through the statues of people and tried to search for Soul frantically.

"_I really like this era. You guys have basketball."_ His voice sounded far away, which discouraged Maka because she didn't want to feel lost like she felt now.

"Basketball disappears? Really?" Maka asked, astounded, spinning in circles to try and look for him.

"Over here stupid." He voice teased, sounding closer now. She turned around and saw him standing in between two people, but when she ran over to where he was he walked away and disappeared once again.

"Aw, stop messing with me." Maka groaned and pleaded.

The two were walking through the crowd of people, playing a small game of cat and mouse. Maka was looking for him, when something hit her. _Meditation of Souls, no wonder it sounded familiar! _She thought. "The song!"

"_Yeah what about it?"_ He shouted from a distant location. She was kind of surprised he responded.

"The person composing that song, it's Wes!" She shouted in excitement. "He'll be done before you know it! We can go and listen to it, all three of us, you, me, and Kid! Especially since summer break is coming up!"

"I can't." He was close again.

Her smile quickly faded away. "How come?"

"_Starting tomorrow, I won't be here anymore." _Far, again.

Her heart plummeted. "Why Soul?"

He appeared before her, and she could see him again. "I'm not supposed to let people in the past know about time travel. I broke that rule." He paused "I won't be able to see you again." Then he disappeared once more.

"I won't tell anyone! My lips are sealed, I promise!" Silence. "Soul! Soul! SOUL!" Maka turned left and right, maneuvering around all the frozen people in the frozen scene, frantically looking for him. "You promised we'd see a basketball game together!"

"_Sorry." _His voice was distant.

"You said we'd see the summer fireworks together!" Her screaming became louder.

"_I'm really sorry."_

She turned in circles, trying to look past the people's shoulders to see him. Trying to get a glimpse of him at least. "Does this mean you don't want to see me in a summer dress? Or graduation?"

"_I'm sorry. I would have liked to have seen that."_

She couldn't stop it, the tears came. "You JERK Soul! I thought this summer was supposed to be the three of us!"

She finally found him, but saw him raise his arm straight up, signaling his position from the frozen crowd.

"Soul…no…" She sobbed and shook her head, already making her way towards where he revealed himself to be, but she stumbled in her haste and her emotional confusion.

He bent his arm back and forth and moved his hand, waving goodbye.

"Soul? Soul! SOUL!" She screamed as time began to flow once again. She pushed through the crowd to reach the spot he last stood, but when she got there he had completely vanished.

_**~THE NEXT DAY~**_

She got a call from Kid last night, and he was asking her if she knew where her bike went. Stein ended up driving him and Liz home since Maka's bike had disappeared, but it was in her garage back at home right at that moment. She walked to school, unable to sleep she ended up pulling an all nighter and therefore had more than enough time to leave home early enough to walk. She couldn't even bring herself to ride her bike, because it was the last thing she had left from Soul.

Maka stood by Soul's desk, and stared at how empty it stood.

"He quit school?"

"Yeah, I heard that he owed debt to some mobsters and now he's gone into hiding."

"Is that true? Are you sure it isn't something like his parents getting a divorce?"

"Well I heard he's marrying some girl from another school because he got her pregnant."

"What? Seriously?" The whole group of girls said.

"Hey, Maka, what's the story?" One of the girls asked her, but Maka ran away, maneuvering through the desks and pushing them aside to get out of her way as she quickly exited the classroom.

She couldn't bear hearing all those rumors, especially not when she knows the truth.

She heard some guys ganging up on Kid, asking him for information on Soul's sudden leave of school. They were teasing him about how much of a man whore he was for getting someone pregnant or how stupid he was for getting into debt and not being able to protect himself or how he had lost it and killed someone and was now on the run from the cops. It made her happy to hear Kid defending their friend.

"You're wrong! I'm telling you he's _not_ like that!"

Kid would say it over and over again through gritted teeth but the guys who were bothering him wouldn't listen and continued their pestering. But when Maka passed him on her hasty exit he broke free from the boys and chased her outside of the classroom. He caught up with her and was walking beside her, matching her speed. The two of them ended up sitting together during lunch under the tree that Maka, Kim, and Tsubaki used to sit under, but now Kim was a complete mess and Tsubaki was still with Black Star.

He sighed. "Geez, what the hell happened to him." He commented. "I mean, I'd expect him to not tell me but he should have at least told _you_ something." He told Maka, but his voice lowered from its frustration to see her saddened expression. "W-Well I mean, considering he had a thing for you and such."

She stayed silent for a while. She'd heard this conversation before, in the future when her and Kid were playing basketball. But she time leaped too far back in the past for that conversation to have taken place. She didn't even think about how she already had this conversation with him, already trying to take in everything, especially the fact that Kid was still alive and sitting right next to her instead of dead at the train tracks…

…and it was all because of Soul. And he was gone.

"Did Soul say that?" Maka barely whispered. She just went alone with the topic, now more interested in it than ever since she found out the truth.

"I thought it was obvious." He said with an honest tone. "Didn't you notice?" Maka stayed silent, not knowing what to say to Kid even though she knew the answer to his question. "Well, you're awkward with stuff like that so I wouldn't really expect you to notice. But then again, maybe, that's why he couldn't tell you."

"Kid…"

He raised an eyebrow at her sudden tone. "Yeah?"

"I'm a horrible person!" She screamed and stood up.

"Say what?"

"He tried to tell me, but I pretended the conversation never happened." She began to cry, clenching her hands into fists. She was shaking. "I should've taken it more seriously! Why didn't I? And now he's…"

"Maka…"

Before he could say anything back that even resembled some sort of comfort to her, she ran away. Breathless, she somehow mustered up enough strength to make her way up a few stories by stairs. She exited the staircase and felt a rush of air hit her face like a slap. She walked onto the roof of the school and ran towards the edge of the roof. It was fenced with the kind of fence that goes around softball and baseball fields. After she ran herself into it she slowly let herself slide down the fence and hooked her fingers onto some holes of the metal fence.

The sky never looked sadder and emptier before and tears started pouring like waterfall as she slammed her head into the fence. "Damnit!" She screamed, and begin sobbing against the fence. She screamed so loud when she cried the whole city might as well have heard her. "Shit…it's all my fault…!" She kept crying to herself. "If I hadn't started time leaping I wouldn't have found out about it and he wouldn't have broken that rule!" She started hiccupping in her cries. "I'm sorry Kid…Soul…"

…

She's back at consulting Wes. Maka sat on the couch with her feet up, hiding her face into her knees. She had told Wes everything, since she traveled so far back all those other conversations she had with him since her first time leap no longer existed. He was now up to par with everything.

"Here." Wes placed a cup of tea on top of a saucer on the coffee table in front of her. "Feel better." He was hoping for some kind of response from her, but she stayed silent. "I always thought that you were just friends with Kid and Soul." He walked back over to his chair and sat down. He continued to talk when she wouldn't respond or make a comment. "To tell you the truth, I assumed that you would graduate without dating either one of them, and then you'd end up going out with someone else entirely."

"_That's what I thought too." _Her voice was muffled when she spoke against her knees.

"But the truth is, that's not how it is at all, is it."

Maka lifted her head up and looked at Wes. She was surprised at how well he was understanding her, it actually started to creep her out a little bit. But because of her stare Wes decided to continue his analyzing.

"If a guy is late to meet up with you, you're the kind of person to go look for him."

"Huh?" Maka raised an eyebrow.

…

Spirit came home and brought his friends Stein, Wes, and Marie. They were going to have some dinner together and talk about, well, whatever immature grownups talk about. "Maka! Papa bought you a while box of candy bars!" He shouted from the downstairs of their house. "Why isn't she coming down? She loves these candy bars."

"Buying her a box just because you're guilty of eating her last one yesterday won't bring her downstairs." Stein lectured, eating a candy bar himself.

"Why not? She loves them."

"She heartbroken." Wes said.

"You're kidding!" Spirit commented.

Poor girl, she must be crushed." Marie sympathized with Maka.

"A boy is involved?" Spirit dropped the box on the floor and pushed the sleeves of his suit to his elbows. "I'll kill him!"

"Cut it out Spirit you'll only make things worse!" Stein smacked him on the head.

"Yeah let the girl experience love." Marie punched him in the shoulder. "It's none of your business."

Up in her room, Maka laid on her back, hanging her head off the edge of the bed. Her arms were hanging close to her ears, her hands touching the floor. She stared at the ceiling for what felt like an eternity, barely blinking. She was done crying for the day, and now just felt like nothing. Her eyes moved as she looked around her room, searching for nothing. She was thinking things over, about whether she loved Soul or not, or if it would be better for her to be with Kid now that he was gone. But then there was Liz, and she couldn't do that to her after he had just asked her out, or so she assumed he did.

Her eyes fell onto her arm, and she decided to lift up her sleeve and see her tattoo. She knew it would say 00, but she decided to look at it with a nostalgic feeling or some sort of way to relive her memory and look back on her time leaping, which technically never happened but she still had the memories that remained with her.

It read 01.

"No way!" Her eyes widened and she was so shocked she ended up sliding off the bed and landing on her head. She quickly somersaulted backwards and stood up, grabbing her arm again to get another look at it. "I swear it said 00 before."

She pondered over it for a little while longer, then gasped loudly and ran out of her room. _It can't be!_ She thought to herself. She ran past her papa, Wes, Stein, and Marie.

"Hey Maka! Where are you going?" Spirit called out to her.

"Let her be." Marie waved him to come back and sit over with everyone else.

She ignored her father's call and quickly went through the front door. She never even bothered to close the door because she was too excited about her discovery.

"_If a guy is late to meet up with you, you're the kind of person to go look for him."_

Wes' voice replayed in her head. Maka ran down the street of her neighborhood as quickly as she could. Her muscles started to ache, but she continued to run as if her life depended on it. She had a chance, a chance to fix everything. She thanked her stars for the miracle that just happened to her. She ran as if the future depended on it because…

…it did.

_Soul time leaped back to steal my bike in order to save Kid, so I got my last one back! If I can go back far enough, he should be able to get his back too!_

Her determination fueled her to run faster and faster.

_This has to work!_

She closed her eyes.

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"_Class this is Soul Eater, please welcome him."_

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"_Hey Soul! Why are you always getting into fights?"_

"_Who are you?"_

"_Name's Kid. This is Maka."_

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"_What are you doing just sitting around Soul? Let's play basketball!"_

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"_Hey wait don't let go yet!"_

"_You're doing it! Look Kid, Soul's riding a bike!"_

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"_Late again Maka?" _

"_You're one to talk!" _

"_You know they've got these things, alarm clocks. Great stuff for waking up on time."_

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"_This summer's gonna be the three of us, promise." _

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"_Maka…What do you say… wanna go out?"_

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"_I mean, I'm not ugly, am I?"_

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"_Because if I _did_ start going out with someone, then I wouldn't be able to hang out with you as much. You'd end up alone."_

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"_Well before you time leaped, there were never any bad things in your life for me to tell you about, right?"_

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"_I knew it was you."_

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"_Would you laugh if I told you I came from… the future."_

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"_Starting tomorrow, I won't be here anymore. I won't be able to see you again."_

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"_I'm sorry."_

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She felt her back pressed against the floor. She was lying down and when she opened her eyes, she saw a pile of books in the air. A second after she opened her eyes, the books fell on top of her and she used her arms to cover her face. After pushing all of them off of her she sat up and looked around. It was after school on the first day, that's what she remembered.

She quickly stood up, not bothering to pick up the books. She crawled on her knees and waited. Then there it was, she heard the rustling noise. She thought about going in quickly to see who it was, but when she decided to go back into the classroom, they were already gone. She walked around to find herself alone once again. She looked around for the object she found, which just happened to be the same object Soul showed her. There was a sparkle in the corner of her eye which immediately got her attention. She bent down to get a closer look and sure enough, it was the object.

"Here it is!" She exclaimed. Maka quickly picked it up and put it in her pocket.

"Maka?"

She heard Kim's voice and stood up from behind the counter, sporting an ear to ear grin on her face. "Right here!" She chuckled uneasily, trying to act natural.

"Is everything alright? I thought I heard a crash." Kim asked her.

"Oh that? Just dropped some books that's all. Nothing going on here!" Maka waved her hand up and down at Kim, excusing the situation.

"Well did you need any help putting them away?" Kim offered.

Maka sighed in relief and muttered in defeat. "Yes please." She was way too exhausted.

The two of them put the books away in silence most of the time. The sun was still bright and shining, breaking into the classroom through the windows. The most noticeable noises were the shouts of the after school sports and the sounds of other students performing their own duties. However, only a few minutes passed before Maka broke the silence.

"Kim, there's something I gotta tell you." Maka said in a soft voice. Her face was blank, not smiling nor frowning.

She looked at her. "Yeah, what is it?" She replied sincerely.

Maka stopped putting away the books and took a short pause before taking in a deep breath. "I like Soul."

"W-What's this all of a sudden?" Kim was completely caught off guard, but let her continue nonetheless.

Maka turned and smiled at Kim. "You like him too, don't you."

She started blushing. "H-How did you-? I never told you that I…!" She waved her hands and arms in front of her, signaling that it wasn't true, but then slumped her shoulders and ultimately gave up. "Ugh…am I that obvious?"

"I'm sorry, Kim." Maka looked away. She couldn't face her after pretty much just taking Kim's love interest away from her.

"It's okay, something told me you two were meant to be together anyways." Kim smiled back at her with a sweet aura surrounding her expression.

"Oh, well, I don't know about that…" She chuckled uneasily.

"I bumped into Soul on the way here. You should go to him." She picked up books from Maka's pile. "I'll finish in here."

"No that's okay I can-"

"Just go you're wasting time! He's waiting for you!" Kim interrupted her, with a gleaming smile as she yelled at her friend.

"O-Okay…!" Maka stuttered and hugged Kim before leaving the room. "I'm really sorry."

…

Maka ran out of the school and headed straight for the basketball court, not bother to take her bike since she went bake to when the brake lever was broken again, and the bike would have been useless. Kid was outside waiting for her, and she stopped in front of him to see what was up.

"Where's Soul?" She asked him.

"Got tired of waiting so he went ahead of us to the basketball court." Kid explained, one hand in his pocket and the other holding his skateboard horizontally in his hand. "We stopped by the lab window and shouted your name, but I guess you didn't hear us."

"Oh, sorry about that." She apologized. Maka looked over his shoulder and saw Liz, Patty, and Jacqueline standing together in a huddle right behind them, watching their every move. Kid noticed she was looking at something and turned around to follow her gaze and look over his shoulder. "You should ask them to play basketball with us." Maka suggested.

"What? I mean sure but, do you even know them?" Kid asked her.

"Yeah, I guess you could say that. Oh! Which reminds me." Kid turned his head around as Maka shoved a pointing finger in his face. "If you take my bike it'll cost you twenty dollars."

"Say what?" Kid was confused.

"_Twenty. Dollars._" Maka emphasized. "Come on go ask them." She laughed and pushed Kid towards the three girls.

"Why should I?" Kid stuck his feet on the ground, trying to stop himself from moving as she pushed him.

"It'll be fun trust me!" Maka gave him one last hard push, which cause Kid to stumble over. She started to run away from him to catch up with Soul, but then turned around and flashed him a pleased smile. "By the way! Thanks for waiting for me!" She waved to him.

Kid smiled. "Sure!" He responded, then walked over to them.

…

He was already by the hoop, dribbling and playing by himself. He shot some two pointers, then a three pointer, then some free throws. Maka hid behind a tree for a few moments and took the object out of her pocket. She looked at it on her open palm, stared at it for a while, then took a deep breath and clenched her fingers around it. She took a huge gulp then appeared out from behind the tree and walked onto the court.

"Hey, where's Kid?" Soul stopped dribbling the ball and put it under his arm.

"He's not coming." She replied quickly.

"What? Why not?" He raised an eyebrow and his tone to fit his surprise.

Instead of responding to him she merely put her fist out in front of him and opened her hand up. She held the object in between her and Soul. He just stared at her in disbelief, surprised at first but trying to keep his cool façade.

"W-Where did you find that?" He asked her as nonchalantly as he could, but his voice cracked slightly.

"In the science lab." She lowered her voice to barely a whisper.

He lowered his voice too, only speaking in a more serious tone. "Do you know what it is?"

She nodded her head. "You told me."

His reaction was obvious and noticeable. His voice started to stutter and he instantly became incredulously defensive. "W-What? I didn't tell you!"

"Yeah, you did."

He scoffed, trying to keep his cool. "Give me a break. I never told you about it."

Maka took a few steps closer to him. "Actually, you told me everything." She said sternly. "About how you're from the future, about what this thing does, about why you're here." She grabbed his hand so she could place it in the palm of his hand. When she did it crushed immediately like when he did it, or didn't do it since time was now reversed. She pulled away his watch strap, revealing a '01' on his wrist. "I knew it." She said. "Thanks goodness." She smiled, relieved her plan had worked and his last leap was returned to him.

"When did I tell you all this?" He asked her.

"Technically in the future, but that doesn't exist anymore." She assured him and looked up to face him.

"Did you time leap?" Maka nodded her head. "So…you can time leap." Soul guessed.

"I used to, but not anymore." She confessed, and showed him the '00' on her arm.

"I actually told you everything?" He dropped the ball so he could shove his hands in his pocket. He asked because he still couldn't believe it.

Maka nodded her head.

"And you believed me?"

She nodded her head again.

He groaned and took one hand out of his pocket to run it through his hair. "Geez why would I tell you all that? I'm such an idiot." He insulted himself.

Everything around them went by without a hitch. Maka and Soul walked together to the lake and sat on the grass along the edge of it. They were by the sidewalk that the two of them rode the bike on when they doubled, when Soul asked her out.

It was sunset now, and the sky was painted in all shades of light fading to dark. Around them, lady and her son weren't nearly run over by Maka and her bike, and they went home happily. The train went past the crossing without hitting anybody. By the time Kid convinced the others to play with them and all four of them made it to the basketball court, Maka and Soul had already left. They even left the basketball in the center of the court. The four of them decided to play against each other while the other two sat by the lake.

Maka and Soul sat a few feet apart from each other. Maka had her legs together, her knees were chin level and she wrapped her arms around the calves of her legs. Soul laid on his back on the grass, the back of his head resting on his hands like a pillow as he put his arms behind his head. They sat in silence for a while, just trying to soak in everything they had realized.

"When you go back to the future, enjoy that song." Soul looked at her, surprised at her sudden statement. "I'll find a way to preserve it. I'll make sure it gets to you in the future, I promise."

He stared at her for a moment then turned his head and looked forward again. "Thanks." He paused. "I'd appreciate it."

Silence. "You know, I was supposed to go back a long time ago, but before I knew it, it was summer. You guys were so much fun I guess time sort of just, flew by."

"That's not all you said." Maka murmured, saying it in the lowest volume her voice could manage that would still allow him to hear her.

"Then what'd I say?" Soul looked back over at her, raising an eyebrow.

Maka stared at him for a while, scrunching her eyebrows, contemplating if she should tell him he had confessed his love for her. But that wouldn't be right, so she turned her head away from him, avoiding his gaze. "Not telling."

Soul leaned his body closer to hers. "Come on, why not?"

"It's nothing." She protested.

He chuckled at her childish behavior. "I'm serious you gotta tell me what I said." He reached a hand out to touch her, hoping to get her attention.

"HAHA LOOK AT THE TWO LOVEBIRDS!"

His hand froze, only a few inches away from her and the two of them looked over at the source of the interruption.

"What?" Maka said bewildered. Her cheeks started to blush a little, though her tone gave off a feeling of denial.

"YOU'RE IN LOVE! YOU'RE IN LOVE!"

"Get lost rugrats!" Soul stood up and threw a rock at them, intentionally missing, but it did the job. The kids that were making fun of them quickly ran away, suddenly not wanting to mess with the older kids, because that's just not something you do when you're in grade school.

"You don't have to be so violent!" Maka hit him on the back of his head.

Soul quickly put on hand behind his head, and rubbed the tender spot. He shoved the other hand in his pocket and turned around to see that Maka had stood up too. "You're one to talk!" He argued back.

She crossed her arms and pouted. "You haven't changed one bit, even in the end." She sulked.

He couldn't help it. Seeing her face made him crack up immediately. He laughed so hard he threw his head back for a few seconds, then took his hand off from the back of his head and rested it on top of her head, ruffling up her hair slightly, sort of like petting a dog.

He stopped laughing and smiled at her earnestly.

"Say bye to Kid for me." His tone was rather solemn now. "Tell him I'm sorry I couldn't say goodbye in person."

She softened her face, bringing it from its irritated composure back to its more apathetic look. "Sure." She whispered.

He took his hand off her head and brought it back to his side, joining his other hand inside his pockets. He gave her one last smile, then turned his back to her. The steps he took walking away from her, were slow, and each one felt heavier than the previous ones. Maka just stood there, watching him leave. _He's not just going to leave it like _this_? _She thought, completely dumbstruck. She considered chasing after him, if he was forgetting to say something to her. But she came to the conclusion it was probably better this way, he was leaving, going back to his time. Her head hung and she looked down at her feet, struggling with her conflicting feelings and indecision.

"Wait, there's one more thing."

Her head immediately shot up at his voice, and she saw that he had stopped leaving and actually started walking back towards her. "Yeah?" She said in a hopeful tone,

He made it back over to her, so they were only about a foot apart or so. He took a hand out of his pocket again, and rubbed the back of his head, only it wasn't to relieve pain.

"There's something I've been meaning to tell you for a while now." His eyes roved around, avoiding her gaze.

However, she stared intently at him. "Well come on, what is it?" She asked, pretending she had no idea what to expect.

He took a dramatic pause, and sucked in a deep breath only to let out a heavy sigh. "Listen…don't go getting yourself hurt by going out and jumping in front of things okay? You can't time leap anymore."

"Aw…" Maka frowned. She was disappointed because that was not what she expected to hear, or was hoping to hear rather.

He didn't take it as disappointment in her tone, but as her complaining that he was nagging. "I'm serious! And really get yourself a clock and don't lose track of time." He continued to nag.

"Unbelievable." Her lip quivered slightly. "_That's_ the last thing you have to say to me?"

He chuckled, completely unaware of her feelings. "I'm looking out for you stupid!"

"_Fine_ then. Thank you _so much_ for 'looking out for me.'" Maka grabbed his shoulders and turned him around. "Why don't you just _go_!" She pressed her hands against his back and pushed him back in the direction he previously began to leave in. It took all her muscle due to his resistance, and he was more than physically stronger than her.

"Woah, what are you so upset about?"

She close her eyes to hold back tears, so she couldn't really see where she was pushing him. "Just _go_ already!" She shouted.

"Okay _pushy_." She finally stopped moving him around and let him walk on his own. He took one look at her expression and started to feel guilty. He didn't want to leave her just yet, but she insisted he leave now, so he couldn't really argue. He turned his back to her again and waved a hand goodbye without turning around. "See ya."

"Yeah _see ya_!" She screamed back at him.

She turned her back to him and wiped her tears away from her eyes. She hiccupped a little, trying to stop the crying, and wasn't full out balling yet. A couple biked past her, and she heard the sound of the waves crashing onto shore that came from the lake, the sounds of the kids who came back to where he threw the rock at them and they were taking turns skipping rocks across the water. How was she supposed to react when he just so willingly left? Of course she told him to, but she had it in her mind that if he really cared about her like Kid said he would have put up some sort of fight, right?

She turned around completely just a mere few seconds after she had literally pushed him away from her.

"I don't get it…!" She was staring at the spot he was standing in barely a minute earlier. She looked around for him for a while, the tears still greeting her cheeks. He was nowhere in sight. _How could he have disappeared so fast? _was a thought in the back of her mind, but not the main one. "I thought he...!"

She stood there, crying and finally balling her eyes out. She was frantic. She could not believe he had just left her without saying anything. In her head she was kind of mad at Kid, for telling her all those things all those times. Relieved her pain through her eyes for about a minute longer, then swiveled around and started walking away. She needed to go somewhere, anywhere. She wanted to be alone because her brain was practically fried with everything that had happened.

Just when she had just realized how she felt, he had disappeared from her life as soon as she was willing to let him enter it. It would have been perfect. The two of them even agreed at one point that once Kid got a girlfriend he wouldn't be hanging around them too much, so it would have all worked out. Of course, it would still be the three of them at most moments. She kept her hands by her face, quickly wiping away the tears that continued to rain down from her eyes nonstop.

Suddenly, she felt someone approach her from behind.

She didn't need to see to realize who it was.

Not like she could see anyways, she was wiping tears away.

He grabbed her shoulder from behind and spun her towards him so she could face him. She turned her head around as his arm was being wrapped around her shoulders when he pulled her in. For a split second she was so sure he was about to kiss her, because he leaned his face in closer to hers as she moved closer to his body, but he moved his face to the side and she felt his mouth barely graze her hair as it roamed over her ear. Her own face was pressed into the crook of his neck and she laid her head on his shoulder.

"I'll be waiting for you."

She felt a tickling breeze when he whispered in her ears. Her eyes widened and he brought his other arm around her, holding her securely in his arms in a tightly locked embrace. Her arms were crushed to her sides that she couldn't hug him back, but instead she shoved her face into his chest and cried a little. He didn't cry, instead he kept his sincere but solemn face and used most of his strength to comfort her. Soon he loosened his hold on her and they backed away from each other a little.

"Kay, I won't be long…" She looked up at him and smiled.

He wiped away some of her tears and smiled back at her. He brought his hands down and cupped her face before gently placing a kiss on her cheek. She didn't have a certain reaction to it, but she was definitely not saddened anymore. He put one of his hands back on top of her head and ruffled up her hair as he backed away from her. He furthered the distance between them and as he walked away his hand slid down from her head, down her cheek, until the contact between them was completely gone.

She stood there, frozen. She felt as if time had stopped. She had gotten what she wanted, and the things Kid had told her had just been confirmed. She finally felt some sort of closure, and she stood there with that smile plastered on her face. She was blankly staring, in complete disbelief that he had just hugged her, but absolutely okay with it either way. She blinked, and by the time she had snapped back into the present. She blinked a few more times and looked around for Soul, but just as before…

…he had disappeared.

_**~THE NEXT DAY~**_

"I can't believe it." Kid dribbled the basketball all across the court. "I mean _me_ I can understand but to leave without saying bye to _you_." Kid shot a basket. "Study abroad my ass. He sucks at languages!"

Maka picked up the ball and started dribbling it. "I'm just glad he's doing something with his future." She made it to the free throw line and took a shot.

"_That was great Maka! You got two points!"_ Liz cheered her on, sitting on a bench on the sidelines of the court where their bikes were parked. Her voice was slightly muted from the distance between them.

"Thanks!" She shouted back to her and waved in response. They were playing basketball on the court as a new group of friends. Once Soul left, it just didn't feel the same with just Maka and Kid and in his honor they decided to go ahead and befriend the others.

Kid picked up the rolling ball and passed it to Jacqueline, who started trying to dribble it past Patty. "But I mean it's _summer_. Can't believe he just left."

"Let's cheer him on!" Tsubaki suggested, catching the basketball that Black Star had just stolen from Jackie.

"I heard he was a strong fighter." Black Star shot a three pointer. "_I_ wanted to fight him!"

"Nah, he changed. Maka kept him in line_._" Kid joked and winked at her to tease her.

Maka smiled back. "No, he was still the same." She tossed the ball to Kid. "Even in the end." She commented to herself.

"Huh? Did he tell you something?" Kid heard her comments, and passed the ball to Black Star.

"Like what?" She responded in a feigned innocent tone with a teasing smile and a huge grin. Jackie, Liz, Patty, Black Star, and Tsubaki began their own game of basketball after Liz decided to join in. Kid walked over to Maka to interrogate her some more.

"He _did_, didn't he!" Kid exclaimed. "Well, what'd he say?"

"Nothing!" Maka laughed.

"Seriously tell me!" Kid started getting antsy and continued to pester Maka, but he started laughing as well. "What was it!"

She turned her head around and calmed her laughter down to give him an angelic smile.

"Tell you some other time."

* * *

><p><em><strong>Time waits for no one<strong>_

**So if you're reading this right now…THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR PUTTING UP WITH THIS EXTREMELY LONG STORY. I hope you enjoyed it and maybe you'll watch the movie now because it's a million times better! I was originally going to make Soul and Black Star be the main best friends but the personalities didn't really fit with how the characters were so I had to switch it up so I apologize for less TsuStar. Oh and Liz being OOC but you know, she's the one for Kid! Or Patty either one would be fine with me. And Kim was the only other person I could see having some sort of crush on Soul other than Maka, so I put her in here! And Jackie had a cameo as well.**

**REVIEW=LOVE  
>LOVE=HAPPINESS<br>HAPPINESS=STORIES  
>STORIES=MORE HAPPINESS<br>MORE HAPPINESS=REVIEW**

**That's a mighty fine cycle if you ask me.**


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